Art

I was surrounded by art from the day I was born. My father Ismael Espinosa Ferrer is a painter and sculptor and our home in Santiago de Cuba was also his studio. It was only natural that I would fill both my home and my restaurants Zafra and Cucharamama with his vibrant paintings. In fact, Zafra’s space is defined by my father’s striking mural painting of three sugar cane cutters at work during the zafra, the sugar cane harvest. The first painting Clara and I hung at Zafra, this large, three-panel mural was soon followed by other luminous canvases.

My father studied painting and sculpture in the famed Havana art school of San Alejandro where he graduated with honors in the 1940’s. After spending some time in New York studying art on a scholarship from San Alejandro, he returned to Santiago where he taught art at the Escuela Normal de Oriente and the Escuela Provincial de Artes Plásticas. He was also a busy painter and sculptor. He exhibited frequently, most often winning gold medals for his paintings, and was hired to do monumental sculptures and murals for many of Santiago’s most important civic institutions like the Escuela de Comercio (School of Commerce), the Elvira Cape Public Library, Santiago’s Cathedral, Balcón de Velázquez, Museo Emilio Bacardi, the University of Oriente, the Hospital Provincial, Colonia Española, and the Banco Nacional. Among his most important works is the sculptural frieze of the Tomb of the Martyrs at Santiago’s Santa Ifigenia Cemetery inspired in José Martí’s poem Yugo y Estrella (Yoke and Star). My father chose this poignant theme to honor a group of young Santiago students who were martyred in the early days of the revolution--, among them Frank País and Pepito Tey, who were also his students at the Escuela Normal.

Little did my father know when he completed this commission that the same revolution that these heroes were trying to protect would betray their hopes for a free Cuba and send him into exile, away from his beloved Santiago de Cuba and his art.

He now lives in Miami with the rest of my family where he paints every day of his life.

Ismael Espinosa Ferrer is represented by Zafra Gallery in Hoboken, NJ. To know more about his work, write to info@zafragallery. com