Enrique Silvestre

Luis Enrique Silvestre Guerra (born in April 4th 1966 in Havana, Cuba) is a contemporary Cuban painter, part of the 90's generation of Cuban Artists working in the Special Period, a period of acute economic crisis and raising censorship. In 1999 he left Cuba and moved to Brazil, where he establish a Studio in the city of São Paulo.
His work uses several visual references from Naif to Pop Art to Abstract Expressionism, to make a commentary on his memories of Cuba, its idiosyncrasies, and life as an expatriate.
== Education ==
Silvestre lived his early years with his grandparents in the model town of Hershey. Returning to Havana, he had brief passages at the Escuela Nacional de Bellas Artes San Alejandro (San Alejandro National Fine Arts School) and the ISDi Instituto Superior de Diseño (Superior Institute of Design) before he landed a job as a graphic designer at Revista Bohemia (Bohemia Magazine).
His work and experiences with Havana cultural environment led to his first artworks, a series of gouache over carton drawings that earned him a Mention at the 1988 Salón de la Ciudad de Havana, and an invitation to join the ISA Instituto Superior de Arte (Superior Institute of Arts), where he was mentored by artists such as Flavio Garciandía and Eduardo Ponjuán, exponents of the Cuban 80’s Generation.
== Career and Influences ==
In his early career during the 90's, Silvestre developed a series of self portraits using Naif figurative studies inspired by Henri Rousseau and Frida Kahlo, called Toda Yerba És Carne (Every Herb is Flesh). The series was a critique of the Special Period, using satire and surrealism. Silvestre continued exhibiting with other artists from his generation in the few spaces allowed by Cuban government until 1999, when he decided to move abroad. Arriving in Brazil, he made contact with the works of artists such as Tunga, Cildo Meireles, Arthur Bispo do Rosário, and art movements like Anthropophagy and Concretism which influenced his later works.
He had individual shows at the Museu Nacional de Belas Artes (Rio de Janeiro – Brazil), the Cultural Center Laurinda Santos Lobo (Rio de Janeiro – Brazil), and group shows at the Cuenca Biennial (Ecuador), the Wilfredo Lam Center (Havana - Cuba), Berini Gallery (Barcelona – Spain), and the Latin American Art Pavillion at the Red Dot Fair in Miami. He is collected by institutions like the Museu Nacional de Belas Artes (Rio de Janeiro – Brazil), the Museu de Arte Contemporânea da Universidade de São Paulo (MAC – USP), among other private collectors. Silvestre also collaborated with the online magazine Cubista.
== Selected Exhibitions ==
SOLO EXHIBITIONS
* 2005 X.Y.Z – Alceu Amoroso Lima Public Library Auditoriun, São Paulo, Brazil
* 2002 Cultural Center Laurinda Santos Lobo, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.
* 2001 Toda Erva é Carne (Every Herb is Flesh), Museu Nacional de Belas Artes, Rio de Janeiro, Brazil.
* 1993 Silvestre entre Silvestre, Un Estudio sobre la Pintura Naif (Silvestre on Silvestre, A Study on Naif) Teodoro Ramos Blanco Gallery, Havana, Cuba.
* 1993 Indios, Cisnes y Otras Cosas (Indians, Swans and Other Things). Two-Artists exhibition in Sala Talia, Havana, Cuba.
GROUP EXHIBITIONS
* 2015 Latin American Art Pavillion. Red Dot Fair 2015. Miami, USA
* 2015 20th Salon of Visual Arts of Vinhedo, São Paulo, Brazil.
* 1999 Pintura e Individuaçao ǀ Painting and Individuality, Art Festival Porto Alegre, Brazil.
* 1996 Biennial of Cuenca, Ecuador.
* 1996 Río Almendares: ni fresa ni chocolate (River Almendares: neither strawberry nor chocolate), Centro Nacional de Conservación, Restauración y Museología (CENCREM), Havana, Cuba. (Catalogue)
* 1995 Hombres Nuevos sin Mundo, La Habana ǀ New Men without World, Havana, Cuba.
* 1994 Más Allá de las aparencias, Exposición colectiva em Galeria Berini, Barcelona España
== References ==
Category:1966 births
Category:Painters
Category:Cuban painter
Category:Cuban people