A retrospective exhibition divided into four thematic sections covering the different chronological moments of the photographic career of José A. Figueroa, from the 1960s up to the present. These four segments correspond at the same time to fundamental moments in the life of the country of which the photographer has been an acute observer and chronicler.

A first section showed his beginnings in Studios Korda (1964-1968) where he developed, at the same time, his personal work that today is considered an indispensable record to understand issues avoided by the official photography about the Cuban youth in the 1960s, as well as the process of emigration grouped by the artist under the title of Exilio. This section included his work as a graphic reporter for magazine Cuba Internacional between 1968 and 1976 throughout the country.

A second section showed his facet as a war correspondent in Angola (1982-1983); his testimonial on the fall of the European socialist block with the series Und Jetzt? (1990); and the harsh subsequent years known in Cuba as the Special Period (1991-2000) that he paradoxically called Proyecto Habana. A third section highlighted images in Figueroa’s work reflecting the manipulation of the national icons such as the Cuban flag, the apostle José Marti and guerilla leader Ernesto Che Guevara.

A fourth and last section included several projects related with the urgent need to review the past in an attempt to find answers that will help relieve future uncertainties. Such was the case of his series New York, September 11 (2001), and Figueroa on Figueroa (2001-2002) and his most recent job about the Cuba-United States relations through the media and the popular culture in the island.

Figueroa’s work goes beyond the primary documentary objective to suggest a state of mind, a shared feeling, a fragment of personal or collective history, told from the viewpoint of his life experience. It may be said that his uninterrupted work of more than 50 years allows the tracing of a political, social and cultural map of these years, without the fear of leaving great voids.