“I had never in my life participated in a demonstration, not even in a parade, because I did not go to the parades that are mandatory in Cuba, those of the regime, I never went to any of that. I already told you I'm kind of claustrophobic, and I wasn't interested. I never went to May Day or schools in the countryside, I didn't go to any of those parades. And then, on November 26 [2020], we were already aware of what was happening with San Isidro, with Luis Manuel [Otero Alcántara]. We were in the middle of the performance of Hembra, which was a premiere that we were doing in Havana, which I am the producer. And we were living through that entire creative stage with the pain of also knowing that there were other artists. The 349 was that terrible law that was affecting and was going to affect many artists, regardless of whether they went through the academy or not. That is to say: Who told Benny Moré that the law 349 was not going to allow him to make music?”
"I finished my studies. The Art Instructors school was a betrayal. I at least feel that it is a betrayal. I am from the first graduation. I felt betrayed in the sense that the first thing was that they were training us to work with the Movement of Amateur Artists in the Houses of Culture. And then, in the second year now, I remember that everything changed and then what we were going to do was teach all kinds of teaching, in primary schools, secondary schools and we had to do, in my case, five years of social service.”
“In schools, elementary school textbooks are full of readings, I don't even know whether to call them patriotic, because patriotic would be beautiful, but these are intentional policies. I have terrible gaps in the history. I think that, from the history of Cuba, I have learned a little later, but until when I finished my primary and secondary studies, I knew practically nothing about the history of Cuba. I was also unlucky because almost all my history teachers were alcoholics, old men by now. So, thre are books, like, well-thumbed, that don't tell you anything and you have to go looking for information afterwards. Unquestionably, schools are an indoctrinated.”
“My grandmother was the only Catholic in my family. She suffered a lot because, in order to allow her eldest son to go to university in Russia, she had to give up the church. When the Revolution triumphed, she was despised because the Catholics and many people went against the statutes of the Communist Party. The Communist Party of Cuba assimilated neither Catholics nor homosexuals. So, her son could go to study at the university in Russia, because my grandmother was a person integrated into work, she worked in a hospital, she had to give up the church, in a small town, where the church is in the center, and had to stop going, and explain that there was nothing religious in the family.”
Dayana Prieto Espinosa was born on July 18, 1985, in the Báguanos municipality, located in the Holguín province, Republic of Cuba. She grew up in a humble Catholic family, surrounded by sugar mill workers. Her father was an art instructor and her mother a lab technician. She was always linked to the Movement of amateur artists of Houses of Culture in her hometown, in which she lived until the age of 15. As a teenager, she resigned from being a member of the Young Communists League, since she saw the injustices that were being committed in Cuba. Following in the footsteps of her father, she also studied the career of Art Instructor, specializing in theater, she did her Social Service in five years and from there she went on to study Audiovisual Production at the University of the Arts. She lived five years in Italy. Because she is the wife of the activist Yunior García, she also received threats from State Security, for which she had to emigrate from the country on November 16, 2021, heading to Madrid, where she currently lives.
Hrdinové 20. století odcházejí. Nesmíme zapomenout. Dokumentujeme a vyprávíme jejich příběhy. Záleží vám na odkazu minulých generací, na občanských postojích, demokracii a vzdělávání? Pomozte nám!
