Minutes of the First Convivencia Contest 2010

First Convivencia Literary Contest 2010

Minutes of the Jury

Prize in the Essay category:

Utopia, Challenges and Difficulties in Today’s Cuba. By Dimas Castellanos Marti, of Bayamo, who lives in Havana

Unanimously and in one of the most difficult discussions that taken by this jury, it emerged as the decision in the prize for a creative essay that addresses the current Cuban reality. For the complete and comprehensive analysis of different phenomena in our society and having found the strings that weave the emerging civil society of the island. The successful use of historical profiles and a language reminiscent of teaching that helps make the essay readable in a single sitting without a too heavy burden of academic language.

Prize in the Audiovisual Script category:

When the Other World Ends. By Henry Constantín Ferreiro, de Camagüey

Unanimously, this jury has awarded this work for its attractive dash and daring, with an excellent rhythm that effectively combines real-life scenes with elements of fiction, without losing credibility. This aesthetic combination gives the project its documentary aspect, formidable values and an anti-hieratic tone. The jury took into account the potential of this script to be produced, it has enough aperture to give freedom to the filmmakers. It retrieves a figure of our literature that has been pushed to the limit of its scriptural and social existence.

Prize in the Story category:

The Exit. By Francis Sánchez Rodríguez, de Ciego de Ávila

Unanimously and with the excellence and narrative art and the ability to overwhelm readers with a clean and modern prose, this book of stories has been highlighted by the jury among the others submitted. This collection shows the mastery of a mature writer and clearly has also penetrated in the chords of poetry. The different planes in which the narrative moves drink from the best part of the best Latin American prose, but it is not indebted to it, rather autonomous and very personal.

Prize in the Poetry category:

This is not a poetic art… By Pedro Lázaro Martínez Martínez, of Pinar del Río.

By a majority, the jury found this collection rewarding its renewal, approaching a performance. For its fluid and diverse poetics and because it is never out of tune, despite the dissimilar subject matter it addresses. For both the freshness and depth of his verse: versatile and greatly organic. Because the dialog established respects the sacred spaces of the reader, with an almost architectural precision, allowing a commendable connectivity among the articles that shape the notebook, resulting in a symphony-book.

Prize in Photography:

Impotence. By Ángel Martínez Capote, of Pinar del Río

Unanimously, the jury believes that this photographic triptych contains a bold sequence that builds to a crescendo. It reviews not only the realism and metaphor but also — successfully — the montage. To the eye of the photographer’s is added the expertise of framing and pressing the shutter at the exact perfect moment.

Meeting in Pinar del Rio, together with the Board of Convivencia, June 29, 2010.

The Jury: (in alphabetical order)

Reinaldo Escobar Casas
Maikel Iglesias Rodríguez
Orlando Luis Pardo Lazo
Yoani Sánchez Cordero
Ángel Santiesteban Prats