Incisive essays, time lines, and 450 ravishing illustrations make for a momentous and dazzling volume chronicling the vibrancy, diversity, and creativity of Cuban drawing, painting, graphic art, and photographs. --Booklist, Saturday, November 1, 2008

The role of photography and reportage is but a nugget of all the art, culture and history packed into this volume, the catalog for the exhibition by the same title that runs through June 8 at the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts.

The Montreal exhibition is unprecedented in scope and was bolstered by the participation of Havana's Museo Nacional de Bellas Artes, as well by numerous private and public institutions and collectors in the United States. The book's cover image is Mario Carreño's Danza afrocubana from 1943, which sold last year at auction for a record $2.6 million to Coral Gables gallery owner Ramón Cernuda, who resold it to an undisclosed Miami collector.

Edited by Montreal Museum curator and director Nathalie Bondil, the book features revelatory essays from 21 experts, timelines depicting the confluence of art and history, stunning photographs of historical significance and images of artwork from some of the island's most notable artists.

It portrays a culture greatly influenced by Europe, Africa and the United States and chronicles trends: how the portrayal of local customs -- costumbrismo -- became important in painting; how, after the rise of modern art in Cuba, the work of the turn-of-the-century painters who had beautifully captured the island's landscape was devalued and dismissed.

If you didn't travel to Montreal to see the most comprehensive museum exhibition of Cuban art, history and culture ever assembled in recent times, you can bring home the images -- and the lessons -- with this book. --The Miami Herald, Sunday, June 1, 2008