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Havana mother embroidering portraits
of the Five
BY
CONCHY PEREZ-FERNANDEZ — Special for Granma
International —
ONE
day I passed by her house and I noticed that she
wasn’t sitting in her usual place in the doorway.
For a long time now, Margarita has been an
attraction for passers-by... perhaps she never even
noticed her popularity. Absorbed in her embroidery
and without specifically deciding to do so she would
show, to whoever was interested, her magical
creations: butterflies, flowers, doves, Cuban
flags...
I
asked and found out she was busy with something
bigger, but they didn’t give me any more details.
Margarita Sánchez Benítez is someone who loves the
manual arts. She began, self-taught, more than two
decades ago, trying to copy the stitches of a pretty
tapestry that her sister had given her.
She
used to combine her work as a machine operator in an
eyeglass-frame factory and her housework with her
embroidery hobby. She couldn’t sleep without
advancing a little on her project: that piece of
cloth that was taking on form and color.
At
the age of 35, she had to retire for medical
reasons. An auto accident had left her with motor
function difficulties, and now she uses a forearm
crutch for walking.
She
admitted to Granma International that at
first, she felt like the disability had ended her
life, but little by little, she began to recover,
and from then on dedicated herself entirely to
designing and embroidering her pieces. And her
devotion grew so much that every member of her
household — her daughters, sister and even her
son-in-law — learned techniques like
cross-stitching. She has participated in numerous
collective exhibitions and her embroidery has won
her several awards.
“I
didn’t believe in what they said about artists
having muses for inspiration, but one afternoon,
deep into my work, one of them visited me. And that
illumination became my main dream.”
From
that moment, she set herself to staying informed
about everything published about the Cuban Five, the
anti-terrorists unjustly locked up in U.S. prisons.
“I
wanted to find a way to support the international
campaign for the return of René González, Ramón
Labańino, Tony Guerrero, Gerardo Hernández and
Fernando González. I wanted to express my solidarity
with them and their families. So, I decided to
embroider their portraits, and that is how I joined
the fight against injustice. My feelings as a mother
and grandmother made my dream become a reality.”
With
a minimum amount of materials, she undertook her
project: jute, different colors of yarn and the
usual needle. The work required all of her patience
and concentration. She put every effort into
imagining the faces of the Five on cloth, both
individually and together.
Her
plans include displaying her collection at the
exhibition room of the Rubén Martínez Villena
Library in the capital’s historic quarter, or in the
Teodoro Ramos Blanco Art Gallery in the Havana
neighborhood of Cerro, where she has lived for 45
years.
Before leaving, I asked about the composition and
colors that she used for her embroidery, which
reproduces one of the collective photographs of the
Five.
“As
a symbol, I used the Cuban flag to emphasize
loyalty, commitment and courage. The colors, of
course, are those of the national emblem, plus black
and a range of browns. For me, the main thing is the
background, in a shade of green, the color of hope,
which ratifies that justice will be done and they
will come home.” |
