Baling Sugarcane, Cuba

Dmitri Baltermants, Russian (born Warsaw, Poland), 1912 - 1990

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negative probably 1970; print 2003

Gelatin silver print

Sheet: 16 × 20 in. (40.6 × 50.8 cm)

Hood Museum of Art, Dartmouth: Purchased through a gift from Harley and Stephen C. Osman, Class of 1956, Tuck 1957

PH.2003.56.221

Geography

Place Made: Russia, Europe

Period

20th century

Object Name

Photograph

Research Area

Photograph

On view

Label

The consumption of sugar at the scale normalized today was only possible through exploited labor on stolen lands. Sugarcane thrives in warm, humid conditions, and colonial empires were intentional in their occupation of countries such as Cuba and the West Indies where sugarcane could flourish. The shadowed mountains of hand-cut sugarcane in Dmitri Baltermants’s photograph indicate the sheer scope
of sugar processing in Cuba. This photo was taken in the 1970s, during the Cuban sugar industry’s early period of decline due to U.S. embargos. In contrast, Pablo Delano’s 2012 photographs show the abandoned sugar factories in the West Indies—these once-bustling facilities are now in a state of decay, their massive machinery left to rust.

Course History

GOVT 7, Politics and Culture in Cuba, Lisa Baldez, Winter 2012

GOVT 7, Politics of Cuba, Lisa Baldez, Winter 2013

GOVT 7, Politics and Culture of Cuba, Lisa Baldez, Winter 2014

Anthropology 3.01, Introduction to Cultural Anthropology, Charis Boke, Summer 2024

First Year Student Enrichment Program, Rachel Obbard, Summer 2024

Exhibition History

From the Field: Tracing Foodways Through Art, Owen Robertson Cheatham Gallery, Hood Museum of Art, Dartmouth College, Hanover, New Hampshire, June 8-November 3, 2024.

Provenance

Produced by the Dmitri Baltermants Collection, LLC, Scarsdale, New York; sold to present collection (arranged through Harley and Stephen C. Osman, Class of 1956, Tuck 1957), 2003.

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