New graffiti is present on Havana’s walls. In large cursive letters thier author writes the word “Sexto” — Sixth — at times finishing off the the writing with a star, other times adding to the text the image of a face. It reminds me of the pioneer of Cuban graffiti, Chori, who left barely a wall in Havana without his signature made with white chalk back in the ‘60s, and, they tell me, from before that.
Is it a proper name, or perhaps the name of a hip hop group that in my profound musical ignorance I can’t call to mind? A retiree whom I greet now and then in the line for newspapers, asked me if this poster could be some kind of advertising for the Sixth Communist Party Congress, in the style of a campaign invented by Robertico Robaina in the years when he was first secretary of the Young Communist Union (UJC). Do you remember? 31 and Ever Onward and that Ever whatever, commander, ever whatever. But it doesn’t seem that Julio Martinez, the most insipid youth leader in the history of Cuba, is the one that has had the initiative.
Who knows? Maybe it is the sixth child of a marriage, or someone demobilized from military service who celebrates his release remembering the number he had in his unit or a sex maniac with poor spelling, and I can’t even rule out the hypothesis of my retired friend that it is a militant communist who, in this way, is reminding his party leaders that they have already celebrated the end of the congress.
Part of the Dossier of El Sexto, which will appear here piece by piece.
