: Cincuenta y uno años- A collaboration with Cuban Families 2010

51 ration books, 5.25 x 3.25 x 6.25 inches.                        Open edition. Two produced in 2010.

Each ration book- libreta records one year of supplies such as bread, cooking oil, yogurt, meat, eggs, rice, beans and even tobacco for a household. With the help of friends I was given over 100 libretas. Every libreta is very personal. Some are wrapped with plastic or a second paper cover to protect them over the course of a year’s travel from the house to the store. They contain anonymous markings in red, blue or black ink created during the weekly collection of bread and necessities.

In 2007 I was given two libretas and the challenge to create a book with them. The first question I had was, “What are these little notebooks?” I knew about the State subsidized food programs but had no idea how the system worked in daily life. Quickly reading them I discovered each libreta records one year of supplies such as bread, cooking oil, yogurt, meat, eggs, rice, beans and even tobacco for a household.

Returning in 2010 I decided the best way to present these libretas was to bind them into a book with a traditional raised cord binding without any of my usual overprinting of Cuban lithography. How was I, a foreigner, going to get any libretas in Cuba? They were not for sale in the used bookstalls in Plaza de Armas in Old Havana. I needed the help of my Cuban friends to make the dream of showing them in the States a reality. Poco y poco (little by little) I was given over one hundred libretas.

Every libreta is very personal. Some are wrapped with plastic or a second paper cover to protect them over the course of a year’s travel from the house to the store. They contain anonymous drawings in red, blue or black ink created during the weekly collection of bread and necessities. Bound together as whole, I feel that I am in a small way the trustee of each family’s story.

Steven C Daiber            April 19, 2010, Havana, Cuba

En el año 2007 me entregaron dos “libretas” y con ellas un reto: confeccionar un libro. Mi primera reacción fue: ¿“Y esto qué es”? Ya conocía que el estado cubano subsidiaba productos alimenticios de primera necesidad, pero no tenía idea de cómo funcionaba el sistema de racionamiento en la práctica de la vida cotidiana. Después de echarles vistazo me percaté de que cada libreta registra los suministros de alimentos que se entregan anualmente a cada núcleo familiar como por ejemplo: pan, aceite de cocina, yogurt, carne, huevos, arroz, frijoles y hasta una cuota de cigarros y tabacos.

Al regresar a Cuba en 2010, decidí que la mejor forma de exhibir las libretas era encuadernándolas en forma de libro–cosido en el lomo–y sin utilizar las sobreimpresiones de litografías cubanas que usualmente complementan mis grabados. Pero ¿cómo podría un extranjero como yo conseguir las libretas necesarias? No estaban a la venta en los anaqueles de los libreros de la Plaza de Armas en La Habana Vieja. Entonces recurrí a mis amigos cubanos para que me ayudaran a convertir en realidad el sueño de mostrar, en los Estados Unidos, parte de la realidad cubana.  Poco a poco logré reunir cien libretas.

Cada libreta está personalizada, con cubiertas plásticas o con carátulas de revistas, para protegerlas de su viaje anual del mostrador de la bodega a la casa. Cada una tiene en su interior “dibujos” anónimos hechos en tinta roja, azul o negra que registran la huella del consumo de pan y otros productos alimenticios. Al encuadernarlas en un solo libro, tengo la impresión de que, en cierta medida, me he convertido en el albacea de la historia de cada una de estas familias.

Steven C Daiber            19 de abril de 2010, La Habana, Cuba

These 51 libratas are the strongest collaboration- book I’ve done to date. Imagine someone -a stranger asking for your ID, your address, names and birth dates of all the members of your family along a list of the food allotted to you by the local food bank. Everyone goes to the food bank- you have to. That, what I asked of my friends.

When I compared the libretas to my parent’s ration books used during WWII. The response I received was-”Yes, Yes, every foreigner relates these ration books to wartime”.

In showing the libretas to Cubans before returning home (May 2010) the reaction was mixed -awe, pride, sadness or horror, sometimes a quiet shaking of the head. On seeing them bound together one curator pushed herself away from the table. Brushing her hands together side to side, she stood up and stepped even further away from them, refusing to look – too many libratas, too much history.

Abel Sierra essay helps explain the power of the little books.