English (UK)
DeutschJames Clifford Kent is a London-based photographer who lectures on visual culture at Royal Holloway, University of London. He explores ways of telling stories about people using portraiture and social documentary. Over the past two decades, he has travelled regularly to Cuba for photographic projects, with his work being published internationally.
How does the atmosphere in Cuba influence how you document life on the island?
People often ask me what Cuba’s really like – repeating the same tired but popular “frozen in time” myth – while others ask how things are changing on the island.
Cuba is indeed a unique place that operates differently to many developed countries: collapsing buildings, failing infrastructure and the country’s famous almendrones (vintage American cars) are part of daily life for all Cubans. But, like other places, time doesn’t stand still. Cuban culture and society is constantly evolving in response to things happening in the country and around the world.
Every trip there is different, shaped by the ongoing situation and the challenges faced by people living and working on the island.
Food shortages, widening inequality and inflation, have seen Cubans recently take to the streets of Santiago de Cuba, the island’s second-largest city. Cubans’ famed ability to “resistir y vencer” (resist and overcome) in the face of growing hopelessness and uncertainty has been sorely tested. Many ordinary people I photograph talk to me about “la lucha” (the daily struggle) and “la necesidad” (necessity) – themes explored in my ongoing long-form project “¡No hay más na’!” (there’s nothing left), which captures people living on the margins of society.
Why was the Leica M11-P the right camera for this trip?
The M11-P is a reliable and resilient camera built for the challenging conditions on a tropical island such as Cuba. It’s well suited to the type of work I do, and its discreet appearance and quiet mechanical shutter means I can work quickly and unobtrusively, focusing on the things that matter: taking photos and listening to people’s stories.
Cuba is known as a photogenic and vibrant country, and the camera’s high-performance full-frame sensor and vast dynamic range enable you to accurately capture a sense of what it’s really like. This was also the case when working in low light conditions, during rolling evening blackouts in the countryside, when I knew I could trust the camera to capture detailed images. The camera’s built-in Content Credentials – the inclusion of encrypted metadata in compliance with the Content Authenticity Initiative (CAI) – is an important addition for photographers who are looking to tell authentic stories.
Which M-Lens did you choose and why?
On this trip, I used the Leica M11-P with a Summicron-M 1:2/35 ASPH. I’ve used some variations of this lens since I first started working with the M-System over 10 years ago. It’s perfect for switching quickly between capturing documentary and portrait-style images.
What are some of the stories behind your imagery from this trip?
Returning to Havana always feels like going home and I often see people I’ve photographed on previous trips. For example, I’d just arrived in Havana when some children came running towards me. One of them was 4-year-old William – whose family I’d photographed a year earlier living in an abandoned building. He jumped on me. He was out on the street selling vegetables from a plastic crate with other children from the building where they lived. A tragic series of events meant William was born in a Russian prison shortly before his mother was deported back to Cuba. In the eyes of the authorities, he doesn’t exist. His mother told me: “Es un niño fantasma.” (He’s a ghost child.)
One of the people who has featured regularly in my NHMN project is 65-year-old Caridad ‘Cary’ Ribalta Oviedo. She lives alone with her animals in a former laundry run by her family – Chinese immigrants from Guangzhou (Canton City) who settled in Cuba in the late 19th century. She said, “I have lots of memories in this house. As a child, I remember playing here after dark and strange things would happen. My siblings and I would hear people carrying buckets of water but when we looked there was no one there.”
On my final day in Havana, I noticed a young woman named María walking her husky. My Leica cameras caught her eye and she stopped to chat, later posing for a portrait in front of a streetside café. She talked proudly about her dog, revealing: “We called him Ori – short for “orinar” (to urinate) – because he pees everywhere.” It was immediately clear that Maria and Ori adored each other, so I wanted to capture that.
I also travelled beyond the capital to remote parts of the island’s south coast, photographing fishermen, boxers and guajiros (Cuban peasants) – each had a story to tell.
I’ve been photographing my friends Osvaldito Ríos & Ava Álvarez on their family farm in a remote region of Sancti Spíritus for 20 years. The farm has passed down the generations. It was built in 1917 with locally sourced timber and, until recently, was home to a busy tobacco house (a barn used for drying tobacco leaves). Osvaldito’s recent health struggles and the lack of support from local farmhands, the tobacco house fell into disrepair. Osvaldito told me, “We work hard to prevent infectious disease here and keep things clean. But times are tough. Landowners are getting old and it’s like a ghost town. Many young people have left the island.” But despite this, Osvaldito – who turns seventy next year – has no plans to retire. He continues making milk and cheese on his farm and travels weekly to a nearby town to sell his produce. He said, “It’s a quiet life in the countryside and – like my father before me – as long as I’m still able to lift a finger, then I’ll carry on working.”
Towards the end of my trip, I was talking to some friends near the colonial town of Trinidad when suddenly a group of Pentecostal followers descended on a deserted beach for a full immersion baptism. It was surreal. I’d never seen anything like it and got soaked trying to get the picture, but it was worth it.
Cuba is a country where you can expect the unexpected.
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