Artex’s promotion and commercialization Agency for Technical and Professional Services has been in charge of spreading the work of Cuba’s best artistic exponentsinternationallyfor almost two decades.
The Meeting of Ballet Academies in Havana and Ramona de Sáa Bello, director of the National Ballet School, highlights the experiences of Cuban choreographers, professors and dancers in Brazil, signs a new cooperation agreement with that South American nation and for that thanks D’Arte professional services agency. However, the renovation and expansion of the contract that has taken many Cuban dancers to Brazil is but the tip of the iceberg; D’Arte also offers to the world Cuban cultural talent in all its dimensions.
The General Manager of the Agency, Leonor Vicéns Martínez, explains that the company “is authorized to export all kinds of technical assistance or qualified labor force, which also means sharing knowledge and experience. We export professors for all artistic and cultural manifestations. But not just that, we also export professionals such as dancers, singers, circus artists, chefs, librarians, editors, producers and many others. Ballet and music, for instance are in high demand, mostly in Brazil and Mexico, where the Cuban teaching method is highly coveted”.
D’Arte emerged in 1997 as a means of organizing the export of technical assistance and professionals out of Cuba. Nowadays, it works as intermediary between international clients and professionals. That’s why; it relies on résumés of excellent artists and professionals to show to the nations requesting cooperation. In cases that an artist has been hired already, the agency acts as representative of the interests of the Cuban professional and takes care of the implementation of procedures.
“We started with a small group but today we have more than a thousand professionals working abroad in more than 25 countries, in addition to the Cultural Mission in Venezuela. We can establish work commitments with state entities as well as with private companies. Latin America is our largest customer”, expressed Vicéns, who has been working for D’Arte for more than 12 years.
In addition to offering artists the possibility to perform in different cultural spaces, the agency also offer a broad range of opportunities such as postgraduate courses, masters’ degrees, PhDs and all sorts of artistic professional improvement, methodological and didactic advice, as well as training and teaching evaluation.
The agency belongs to Artex S.A. and economically contributes with obtaining the resources Cuban culture demands: “Artists can contribute with the system. For instance, financial resources generated through D’Arte are put into artistic teaching, mostly in didactic materials and instruments, which are renovated annually”, pointed out the General Manager.
In Cuba’s new socioeconomic environment, D’Arte offers highly qualified human resources in the fields of teaching and artistic creation as such, never forgetting its main purpose: “Maintaining Cuban art abroad is the main achievement of the agency. That, and offering the world excellent professionals that represent our country, with the most authentic elements of our Cuban culture”,she noted.
