Felipe Dulzaide + Gottardi

Utopia Posible, 2008
Model, Wall-theater, digital slide projection, photographs, drawings, single channel video projection
Dimensions variable
ⓒ Felipe Dulzaides & Roberto Gottardi Courtesy the artists

Text taken from the Gwangju Biennale

The work of Felipe Dulzaides ranges from video and performance, installations, and public art works. The staging of a “proof,” the verifiable accounting or archiving of what seems impossible, is a recurrent theme throughout most of his pieces. The project Utopia posible is composed of several components. Each of these components addresses different aspects of a compelling story about an unfinished dramatic art school, its architect and the evolution of the design that will complete it. The story of this unfinished school and its architect echoes the story of a utopian social project. In 1961 Fidel Castro and Che Guevara envisioned the creation of an art school complex, now named Instituto Superior de Arte (ISA), to be located on the grounds of an exclusive country club in Havana. Among the group of architects commissioned to the project in 1961 was Roberto Gottardi.
He was charged with designing the Dramatic Arts School. The
construction of this building was drastically interrupted in 1965. It
remains unfinished to this day. The building complex that this school is part is now considered to be the architecture that best captures the Utopian spirit of the Cuban revolution.