Reclaiming Body and Soul: the Case of Marta Maria Perez Bravo

By: Rada Georgieva

The photographic oeuvre of Marta Maria Perez Bravo (1959-present) is paradigmatic of the aesthetic and conceptual shift, which occurred on the Cuban art scene between the 1990s and the early 2000s. This was due to a drastic change in the politico-economic relationship between Cuba and the Soviet Union after the latter’s fall. The period was marked by an economic crisis, which paradoxically led to a relative opening-up of the artistic scene in the country and to a reduced degree of cultural censorship. Photography, in particular, had been a principal medium of visual propaganda since the Cuban Revolution, where the subjects portrayed were most often the political leaders of the country, and the masses – the collective face of the Cuban state. The drastic change of direction observed in the work of Perez Bravo signifies a newfound focus on human subjectivity and individuality. In Perez-Bravo’s self-portraits the artist is both the creator of the images and their subject matter – the result is a reflexive body of work, which deals with de-mystifying idealized notions of womanhood and femininity, the experience of exile, and the relationship between corporeality and spirituality.

Marta María Pérez, Basta ver como brillan [Just see how they shine], 2000, silver gelatin photograph, 50 x 40 cm, © Archives of Women Artists, Research and Exhibitions, Source: https://awarewomenartists.com/en/artiste/marta-maria-perez/

Perez Bravo’s photographs are notably influenced by the Cuban practices of two syncretic religions – Santeria and Palo Monte. Santeria fuses Yoruba, Roman Catholic beliefs, and Spiritism. It resulted from the clash of worldviews, which was perpetuated by the slave trade during the colonial period. On the other hand, Palo Monte is heavily indebted to the Kongo religion of Central Africa. Originally practiced clandestinely, Santeria and Palo Monte are an Afro-Cuban aspect of the manifold layering of different religious systems, which shaped colonial Cuba. Because of its local specificity, Santeria and Palo Monte became a common trope in modernist and postmodernist works of art, as they conveyed a sense of national identity. Furthermore, Santeria in particular provided a conceptual anchor for artists in exile who struggled to identify with their cultural origins. Probably the most widely known of these artists is Ana Mendieta, who incorporated Santeria practices in her performance pieces, exploring through them the relationship between the female body and nature. Nonetheless, Perez Bravo’s oeuvre offers a different perspective by including visual references to Santeria in relation to her personal experience of femininity and of becoming a mother.

Marta Maria Perez Bravo, Macuto, 1992, silver gelatin photograph, 40 x 50 cm. © Archives of Women Artists, Research and Exhibitions, Source: https://awarewomenartists.com/en/artiste/marta-maria-perez/

Macuto, 1992 epitomizes Perez Bravo’s aesthetics. Her images are almost always centrally oriented. They display a diffused focus around a black and white subject, set against a luminescent white background. These formal considerations imbue the photographs with an almost ritual soberness and a visual force. Thus, the spiritual character of the objects Perez Bravo usually includes in her works is emphasized: crosses, statuettes, knives, cowries, feathers, necklaces. Her face is never accessible to the viewer’s gaze – it is either veiled, as in Proteccion (Protection), 1995 or the head is completely cut off from the composition. This is rooted in Perez Bravo’s personal preoccupation with safeguarding herself – her health, her fortune and her physicality. The result is fragmented depiction of the female body, exposed and utterly vulnerable in its naked state, yet spiritually unattainable.

Marta María Pérez, Proteccion [Protection], 1990, photogravure, 66 x 66 cm. © Archives of Women Artists, Research and Exhibitions, Source: https://awarewomenartists.com/en/artiste/marta-maria-perez/

At the center of the photograph is the artist’s naked chest, while against it she holds a sacred bundle called macuto. This is a protective charm in Palo Monte practices and it comprises two small statues, which act as a source of power. However, in this case the statuettes bear more than simply spiritual connotations – Perez Bravo includes them in her work frequently - as to her they represent her twins. This is closely linked to the importance, which Perez Bravo places on motherhood in relation to her embodied subjectivity – it is a source of energy and protection. On the artist’s chest there is a drawing of a ‘’cosmogram’’. This is a central element of the Kongo belief system. It is a symbol known as firma or ‘’signature’’ and it acts as a conduit for the spirits in rituals. It also represents ‘’the four moments of the sun’’ – dawn, noon, sunset and rebirth as a metaphor for the human life. This is the ultimate symbol of spiritual continuity and renaissance. The artist holds the macuto at the center of the cosmogram, equating the chest of a woman with the center of sacred cosmology, in relation to maternity. This creates a powerful reference to motherhood as a source not just of power, but also of spiritual protection.

The aesthetics employed by Perez Bravo are reminiscent of the tradition of studio photography which was at its peak in the beginning of the twentieth century. One of its Cuban pioneers was Joaquin Blez Marce. His depictions of nudes exhibit a specific handling of light – illuminating the model’s body from the side to imbue it with a more sculptural appearance and create an illusion of volume on the photograph’s flat surface. He also made use of the sfumato-like defused focus around the edges of the subject to create greater visual magnetism. Perez Bravo’s use of chiaroscuro and blur is comparable, yet while Blez Marce’s works subject the female nude to the gaze of a clearly male spectator, Perez Bravo’s intimate depictions of her own body subvert his methods to reclaim a certain agency for the female body as both creator and creation. Furthermore, the mise-en-scene of her photographs where the body is never passive but always interacts with ritual objects creates a decidedly performative work of art, where the photograph acts both as testimony, and a mediator to express the desire of transcending one’s merely corporeal existence.

Joaquin Blez Marce, Untitled, 1920s. Source: https://www.bexfotografia.com/cuba/joaquin-blez.php

 Another work which marks the artist/subject’s body as a focal point of meanings is No zozobra la barca de su vida (Do not keel over the boat of your life), 1995. The female body here stands as nothing less than the boat, to which paddles are attached. Hence, it carries meanings as passengers, referring to the 35 000 Cubans who set out across the sea towards the United States in 1994. Alternatively, the image can be read as an allusion to the goddess Yemaya who in Santeria beliefs represents fertility and is connected to the sea. By positing the female body both as a vessel for socio-historical meaning, and as a source of creative and maternal power through association with the goddess, Perez Bravo creates an image, which becomes more than an artistic object. The result is a picture which itself becomes a body in the world, with which the viewer associates by means of their vision and awareness of their own physical existence.

Marta Maria Perez Bravo, No zozobra la barca de su vida, 1995. Source: https://www.artsy.net/artwork/marta-maria-perez-bravo-no-zozobra-la-barca-su-vida

Perez Bravo’s recovery of the individual’s body from the state’s collective body through depictions of the self recalls the notion that we as humans most often gain a sense of self through vision – by looking at our bodies we affirm our physical reality. Perez Bravo’s photographic self-portraits give form to this corporeality. The body is understood in relation to the spirit as a guarantor of the self in continuity with the world. This leads to an idea of the body not as an object but as an entity onto which social meanings and lived experiences are inscribed. Thus, the body is a self-contained microcosm, whose boundaries are the point of contact with other people and objects, fluctuating between being a subject for the gaze of the other and being the one who does the looking. Perez Bravo’s photographs mark this contingency by their active self-referentiality.

NOTES:

Aliaga, Juan Vicente. ‘Marta Maria Perez Bravo.’ In Artforum International, March 1998. https://www.artforum.com/print/reviews/199803/marta-maria-perez-bravo-51832

Bettelheim, Judith. “Palo Monte Mayombe and Its Influence on Cuban Contemporary Art.” African Arts 34, no. 2 (2001): 36–96. https://doi.org/10.2307/3337912.

Jones, Amelia. ‘Body’. In Nelson, Robert S. and Shiff, Richard (Eds.) Critical Terms for Art History. Second Edition. Chicago: Chicago University Press, 2003

Mosquera, Gerardo. “Africa in the Art of Latin America.” Art Journal 51, no. 4 (1992): 30–38. https://doi.org/10.2307/777282.

Tapia , Lidia Hernández. ‘La Vuelta del Sujeto en la Fotografia Cubana del Fin de Milenio: Martha Maria Perez y Rene Peña’. In CUNY Academic Commons, vol. 16. https://lljournal.commons.gc.cuny.edu/vuelta/