About
Mission
Considered to be a mainstay of the arts renaissance in Little Havana, Cubaocho is a museum and gathering space where art, music, dance, cigars and mojitos converge. Art lovers can gaze at the museum’s large collection of 19th century and early- to mid-20th century Cuban art as they sip on a cocktail. Besides its art collection, Cuba Ocho is also home to a research library and cafe bar boasting an impressive selection of rums. Looking to get down to a legendary descarga? If so, you’ve come to the right place. Live entertainment offerings at CubaOcho abound, ranging from salsa bands to Latin jam sessions and Cuban jazz legends.
History
The Ramos Cuban Art Collection (1800-1958) by Roberto Ramos.
Roberto Ramos is considered by connoisseurs as one of the most diligent collectors of Cuban art, specifically from the period between 1800 and 1958, the last year of the republican period of the Cuban nation before Castro's regime.
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It is also shocking to learn that the first ten paintings in their small collection were about to end up at the bottom of the sea along with the "Rosita II", the boat used by the Ramos brothers for their risky journey to freedom in 1992. They insisted so much , that the coast guards took pity on them and agreed to have the boat towed, thus saving the incipient collection.
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According to Roberto's own testimony in the careful and well-documented book “Grandes Maestros del Arte Cubano. The Ramos Collection ”, which includes his valuable legacy: -“Through all these years of research, our perspective would change and it would reveal to us up to what extent lies and hate threaten true knowledge. However, despite the fact that the communist system has had the power to rewrite history in its own interest and in its own way, we can verify that it is also possible to recover that part of history, to prevent it from being erased through a firm intention of investigate the actual truth. Seeking the truth freed us”.
This genuine achievement by Roberto, his wife Yeney Fariñas, and their family and friends has had an appreciable impact on the growth of public interest in learning about the historical testimony reflected in most of the works exhibited in the Cubaocho Museum and Performing Arts Center. The beautiful place has on display a good part of this invaluable collection of Cuban painting. We invite to all those who enjoy art and culture to explore this important cultural center, which also has the additional incentive of holding historical furniture once owned by the great American singer Frank Sinatra, plus an invaluable collection of Cuban publications from before 1959, among which we can mention the magazines "Carteles", "Vanidades", "Bohemia", and forty years of the magazine "El Figaro ”.
María Cristina Alarcón and Baltasar Martín.
It is moving to know how the brothers Roberto and Carlos Ramos, at the early age of 17 and 19 years respectively, as a result of receiving the painting "The saxophonist", by Carlos Sobrino, as a gift, for having helped an elderly friend in his move, began to understand that the Cuban cultural essence had been transmitted through works of art, and that the work of painters and artists who had not accepted Fidel, such as Carlos Sobrino, had been hidden and silenced from the official memory, causing this in the two young men, a desire to collect and vindicate that treasure stolen by Castro.