CUBAN DESIGN: Ingenuity and Resiliency to Subsist

Abstract

Since 1959, the Cuban people have been deprived of consumer products common elsewhere due to the political and economic condition in the island, where an everlasting lack of access to basic resources prevails. Driven by necessity, Cubans have resorted to designing creative tools and solutions to subsist, tools which implicitly reflect the history of their environment. Material culture is the sum of things, of objects in which stories are embedded. A visual catalogue of artifacts presents rich and highly charged evidence of an entire cultural history of creativity within a people. Building on previous exposés of similar types of artifacts, by conducting multi-disciplinary analyses of these fascinating hybrid creations designed out of necessity, this study brings a different perspective beyond conventional models of consumerist design. The thesis documents, examines and celebrates the ingenuity of alternative design that the Cuban people have resorted to as a response to the deficiency of resource availability. A curated selection of varying types of home-made Cuban artifacts reveals the object’s association to its historical, political, economic and social context from which they emerged. Each artifact exposes not only the intelligent and resourceful nature of the Cuban people but also their everyday life’s struggle. This thesis seeks to build public awareness of and interest in Cuba’s post-revolution reality.