The Cuban artist Yulier Rodríguez Pérez, known as Yulier P. (Camaguey, 1989), explained in an interview with CiberCuba how his dissenting art has forced him to live outside the official exhibition circuits of the Island, continuously harassed by the Political Police of the Díaz-Canel regime, and also ignored by a significant portion of the audience. "When your art has a political meaning, people disconnect from it," he asserts.
Despite this and how discouraging it is to see that "after all this time, you mean nothing," Yulier P. insists that he will not flee Cuba, selling the little that his family has worked hard to achieve, and much less leaving behind his wife and young son, who already shows promise as an artist because, sometimes, when he is working on a large canvas, the boy dips his brush into the artwork.
Yulier P. has also commented to CiberCuba that many of the graffiti that earned him prestige and popularity in Havana, with their ghostly expressionist images, no longer exist. He also claims that he never erased them, despite the fact that the political police forced him to commit to doing so during one of the many summons he has received from State Security.
Unable to draw graffiti, Yulier P. chose to use pieces of rubble and is now working on what could be his least politicized series, inspired by esotericism.
The artist has also shared the difficulties he faces in obtaining the materials he needs to work effectively, as they are either very expensive or the stores where they used to be sold have now disappeared or are out of stock. Nevertheless, he remains steadfast in his determination to defend his right to live on the Island.
"I'm not going to run away from Cuba," he says after acknowledging that it is a personal decision, that it is not regulated, and that he also doesn't have a clear answer about when he will be able to paint freely.
What he is sure of is that wherever he is, his art will reflect the reality around him and that this is what makes his work deeply political, closely connected to Havana and the city's deterioration.
Anyone interested in purchasing his work can contact him through social media to arrange shipping from Cuba and explore options for making payments outside of Cuba, if necessary.
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