From the age of 14, Lázaro Antonio Martínez Durán developed a passion for drawing. His father, a former military officer and communist activist, enrolled him in a workshop for people with mental disabilities, where he made advertising leaflets. Such workshops are among the few activities offered by the state, and the days are often structured around reading the press, entirely controlled by the government.
Since childhood, Martínez Durán has been cutting out these images of news and propaganda to insert them into cardboard televisions he makes himself, turning his collages into the images displayed on the screens. Two temporalities overlap, revealing the gap between everyday life and often outdated photographs. A product of communist propaganda, he is moved when thinking of Cuba’s revolutionary leaders. Yet his imaginary television broadcasts the clichés of an idealized world, hinting at the consumer dreams of a society under embargo.