{"id":209318,"date":"2019-11-15T09:55:15","date_gmt":"2019-11-15T14:55:15","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/oncubanews.com\/en\/?p=209318"},"modified":"2019-11-15T09:55:15","modified_gmt":"2019-11-15T14:55:15","slug":"havanas-500-years-will-also-be-celebrated-in-miami","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/oncubanews.com\/en\/cuba-usa\/havanas-500-years-will-also-be-celebrated-in-miami\/","title":{"rendered":"Havana\u2019s 500 years will also be celebrated in Miami"},"content":{"rendered":"

Miami<\/span><\/a>, where a large community of Cuban immigrants and their descendants lives, and which is the headquarters of the largest collection of documents and other materials on Cuba outside the island, will also commemorate the 500th anniversary of the foundation of <\/span>Havana<\/span><\/a> with a sample of its treasures, such as a 16th century map, letters from Jos\u00e9 Mart\u00ed and 19th century lithographs.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cThis exhibition projects the message that we have a very wide-ranging vision of what Cuba’s history is. Not only from the outside in, we understand that Cuban culture is far beyond Cuba and the exile,\u201d the director of the Cuban Heritage Collection (CHC) of the University of Miami (UM), Elizabeth Cerejido, said to EFE<\/em> agency.<\/span><\/p>\n

The CHC, the School of Architecture and the Center for Urban and Community Design of UM joined forces to create an exhibition that reviews the five centuries of a \u201cunique\u201d city, according to a press release.<\/span><\/p>\n

The exhibition, which will be on display until February, is complemented by an international symposium on the architectural and urban development of the city during the last five centuries, which is being held this Thursday and Friday.<\/span><\/p>\n

This Saturday, November 16, marks the 500th anniversary of the foundation of the city of San Crist\u00f3bal de La Habana by Spaniard Diego Vel\u00e1zquez de Cu\u00e9llar and the capital of Cuba <\/span>will celebrate<\/span><\/a> it in style.<\/span><\/p>\n

In Miami, some 367 kilometers from the Cuban capital and with a Little Havana among its best known areas, Professor Sonia Chao, curator of the exhibition and organizer of the symposium, sees Havana as \u201ca grand lady and an amalgam of her different historical times.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

She needs \u201canother layer of makeup and surgery,\u201d Chao affirmed, but it should be combined \u201cwith the city\u2019s fabric.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

According to what she said to EFE<\/em>, \u201cmaintaining this jewel doesn\u2019t mean that you have to mummify or keep it in the past, but that its growth be in a way that respects its urban fabric and its historical character.\u201d<\/span><\/p>\n

Among the objects of the Cuban Heritage Collection, founded in 1998 by a group of Cuban librarians based in the United States, some are of great historical value, such as one of the oldest maps of the island of Cuba, from 1546, or letters from the poet Jos\u00e9 Mart\u00ed, Cuba\u2019s national hero.<\/span><\/p>\n

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Old map of Havana. Photo: news.miami.edu\/<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

The collection has been growing since 1998 thanks to donations.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cThere is of course that nostalgia for Havana that many feel, as Cubans who live outside the island, which is also underlying within the exhibition,\u201d says the CHC director.<\/span><\/p>\n

Visitors can see the reproduction of a classic room of a wealthy Havana family with rocking chairs and a balcony with stained glass windows and some of the colonial lithographs by artist Frederic Mialhe Toussaint, who visited the island in the early 19th century.<\/span><\/p>\n

\u201cEverything that is on display in the exhibition comes from the collection. It is a representation of the wealth of the material we have, of the vast collection in various materials, whether maps, historical books, artist’s books or plans,\u201d adds Cerejido.<\/span><\/p>\n

Havana is the second oldest city in the New World among those that are capitals today\u2015the first is Santo Domingo\u2015and in its streets the fusion of various architectural styles from the baroque, the neoclassical or the art deco is evident.<\/span><\/p>\n

In 1982 UNESCO declared the historic center of Old Havana and its fortifications a World Heritage Site.<\/span><\/p>\n

Miles de fuegos artificiales por los 500 a\u00f1os de La Habana<\/a><\/p><\/blockquote>\n