It’s great to spend time in Cuba, where a daiquiri or a mojito is almost as cheap as a MacDonald’s coke, and where , frankly, the restaurant-made hamburgers are far superior than anything MacDonald’s could produce at about the same price and would, no doubt, have to ship over from Miami. 

And then to the coffee.  An expresso is a way of life in Cuba.  Starbucks’s cannot compete except on brand perception which, sadly, many younger people will fall for.  As Donald Trump has succeeded on a view of other countries destroying local jobs, across Latin America there is a view that companies such as Starbuck’s have done the same in their communities and has eliminated quality for corporate consistency.  It’s a two-way view.

Even in London, there is a move to quality, flavour, and to small niche outlets.  Macdonalds and Starbuck’s now represent a world that is in decline. 

How minimalist can an artist go in creating an artwork?  This is what American Bruce Nauman artist explored in the 1970′s with his “Natural Light, Blue Night Room”, creating an architectural white box defined by a strip of natural light at the bottom and blue artificial light at the top, which has been recreated at Blain Southern in London, one of his aims bring to “knock down” the viewer as he enters through an anonymous white door into the blank empty room where the light creates shapes and diagonals as the viewer moves across the space. 

“In the gallery, there were some skylights above one wall. I installed blue fluorescent lights below the sky lights. It messed up your ability to see the space clearly because when you got under them you started getting a lot of afterimages. Everything became a little jumpy… There was nothing else in the space. So the idea was that it would be hard to know what to focus on and even if you did, it would be hard to focus.” (Bruce Nauman).

A darkening room with shimmering prisms that appear and disappear as the viewer walks around the perimeter, creating a disconcerting experience made of only silver thread and light.  Adjacent in another darkened room at Hauser & Wirth London, with the sound of the sea in the background, two pyramids covered with blue pigment, like volcanos, are illuminated by two blue light bulbs hanging overhead “in a permanent flux of transformation”.  

Lygia Pape (1927 – 2004), the influential Brazilian artist, was active in both the Concrete and Neo-Concrete Movements in Brazil during the 1950s and 1960s. From the 1980s onwards, her artwork, while still remaining based in geometry, became more physical, intense and sensory, involving the intellectual and physical participation of the viewer.

“My concern is always invention. I always want to invent a new language that’s different for me and for others, too… I want to discover new things. Because, to me, art is a way of knowing the world… to see how the world is… of getting to know the world”. (Lygia Pape) 

The new President Elect in the USA has drawn attention to the complexity and differences in political views on immigration in the USA; by coincidence Los Angeles’ artist Mike Kelly’s installations at Hauser & Wirth London explore the tensions of the Chinese community in Los Angeles. 

Kelley was fascinated by America’s many diverse subcultures.  He took Los Angeles’ marginalised Chinese-American community as the inspiration for “Framed and Frame”  which recreated local landmarks in Chinatown of Los Angeles with two separate sculptures:  “Framed” is a “wishing well” in the form of a naturalistic concrete grotto with caves and caverns, cheap religious statues that can be purchased in local shops, and coins thrown onto its ledges, under which there is a secret living cave.  “Frame” is more sinister – an enclosure of steel protective fencing, brick walls and barbed wire surrounds the Chinese gate – is this a celebratory entrance gate or a prison? 

For Kelley, the wishing well projects the background of the Chinese-American community in Los Angeles (and many other communities in the US and Canada which he explored in other works), with a history of persecution and exclusion, along with cultural resilience and exchange.  The mixture of Christian and Buddhist votives and Chinese-American kitsch highlights the unique cultural mix that has evolved in LA’s Chinatown since the 19th century.

Mike Kelly was born in October 1954 and sadly was found dead in an apparent suicide in Pasadena in 2012, a sad loss to the art world.

The different experiential rooms are supported by drawings and paintings, valuable to understanding the art concepts.

After a comprehensive reconstruction, which recreated the historic horseshoe auditorium and incorporated modern facilities such as a fly-tower, stage lighting and technical facilities, dressing rooms and accommodation for the artists and an outdoor café/bar and seating area, the theatre reopened in February of 2014, providing a splendid new theatre and concert venue in advance of the refurbishment of the Gran Teatro de La Habana <Alicia Alonso>, both demonstrating Cuba’s commitment to restoration of its historic buildings and to the arts.

Last month, the Theatre was the setting for the last concert in the Festival Mozart Habana 2016 with works by Mozart, Haydn and Schnittke.  The Festival uses a number of different venues across Havana; a few days previously it held a concert in the old Basilica Menor San Francisco de Asis, built in the late 16^th century and remodelled in 1730.  A happy disaster in the church’s history was the collapse of the dome above the altar; the reconstruction accidentally achieving some of the best acoustics for musical performances in Cuba.

For the last week, Havana has been hosting the 25th Festival International de Ballet de La Habana <Alicia Alonso> and the great lady, who is 95 years old and still active, has been at the performances.

The theatre claims to be the oldest in Latin America, with a history going back to the opening of the Teatro Tacón in 1827, hosting international artists such as Enrico Caruso and Sarah Bernhardt.  In the early 20^th century, a new building – then named the Galician Centre of Havana – was constructed to designs of the architect Paul Belau and with an elaborate façade including sculptures by Giuseppe Moretti depicting benevolence, education, music and theatre.  At its heart is the Garcia Lorca Auditorium which seats 1,500, in addition to other smaller spaces and rehearsal rooms.  The Theatre is an outstanding venue which contrasts with the modernist Teatro National in the Plaza de la Revolucion which, although it has had new seating could do with some additional space for support facilities which clutter the outside of the building.

The transformation is part of a programme of regeneration in Havana, including the recent refurbishment of the Teatro Marti and the ongoing refurbishment of the old Capitol Building, into which the Parliament will move, in addition to new hotel developments.  A great deal remains to be done, and the Gran Teatro de La Habana <Alicia Alonso> sets a high standard for the future.

The volumes of the old industrial buildings have been simply adapted without frills and complimentary industrial additions have been added at the rear, constructed from shipping containers, reinforcing the industrial chic, enabling the visitor to order a drink from one of the several bars and wander through the art and photography exhibitions and enjoy the performances and discos later in the evening. 

The idea may be borrowed from warehouse districts in areas such as Brooklyn, Buffalo, Berlin and Liverpool, but here it is done incredibly well, in part because Cubans are less precious about the disruption that such a popular cultural and music venues might cause to its neighbours, celebrating the life and vitality that results.  Cubans love music, dance and fun!

As with the El Cocinero, the Arts Factory is the inspiration of  X Alfonso.  It treads a careful path in terms of its art and photography exhibitions, showing both Cuban and international artists – currently including Czechoslovakian artists and jewelry design from Austria, while on the architectural front, it is showing the latest housing/living projects from predominantly German architects.  The photography exhibitions on the top floor are the best parts, innovative, varied and challenging in ways that could not have been considered a decade ago, for which the partners must be congratulated 

Payment is simple.  There is a small entry charge for which visitors are given a card onto which to charge drinks and food (maximum 30 CUC’s), saving the bars wasting time with cash and allowing visitors to settle up at the end – all so simple.

Could this happen in London?  It seems unlikely at the moment – there is not the same tolerance of noise, traffic and queues of people cheek by jowl with residential areas.  Perhaps in other industrial cities such as Liverpool where there are similar industrial warehouse arts venues such as the Cairns Brewery and Blades factory venue, though not of this scale.  Perhaps 180 Strand, an 1980’s building owned by Vinyl Factory, may come near in due course – already it runs art exhibitions and events and, apart from the new residential development at 190 Strand, there are few residents nearby to complain.  A great plus, perhaps, is that the students at King’s College London and the London School of Economics are adjacent. 

Visitors enter through a small door at the base of the chimney to climb up to the rooftop bar and restaurant level.  The climate helps, of course, with the ability to enjoy warm evenings outside for most of the year, while there are also indoor restaurant areas.  The arts theme of the adjacent La Fábrica de Arte Cubano, which can be viewed through the lofty windows of the main factory building, is taken up in the décor including the moving light installation inside the chimney itself, worth climbing up a further staircase to see, old enamel signs and arty lettering graphics on the toilet walls – what can you read here?   Furniture is contemporary including some that ironically is the same as used in Wapping Food in London, formerly also in an old industrial building, but sadly now closed.

Havana is a city of contrasts; a huge amount needs to be done, but creative partnerships between entrepreneurs such as X-Alfonso and the Cuban Government are transforming the bar and restaurant scene in Cuba and hopefully will act as a catalyst for improvement in the adjacent area. 

To compliment the historic buildings, Thomas Heatherwick has designed a modern centrepiece of two connected glass houses that appear to float on the water of the river and contain botanical plants used in the creation and flavouring of gin, with a structure of glass and steel waves which rises up and appears to twist and turn into the old buildings at high level. The two separate structures provide a humid environment for spices which from the tropics and a dry temperate zone for Mediterranean plants.

Visitors are able to learn and experience how the gin is made, wander around the perfectly clean distillery and attend cocktail classes.  There is a display of some of the cocktail glasses from Bombay Sapphire’s design competitions over the years, a shop and a café which spills out onto an open sitting area overlooking the river.  Bombay Sapphire is hoping to attract 100,000 visitors a year to the new centre.

The project is a good example of sensitive, but honest, reuse of existing buildings where the interiors have been re-fashioned for their new uses, while keeping essential features such as the roof trusses and the old doors to the vaults where the bank-notes were once stored.  New detailing is simple and reflects the industrial character of the complex while, externally, the buildings have been repaired but not restored, and thus they still retain the characteristic patina of age.  In achieving a BREEAM Outstanding rating, the project shows that environmental and architectural sustainability can go hand in hand.

It is perhaps a little disappointing however to find that the water from the River Test is not used in the production process – water is shipped in from the previous site in order to maintain the characteristic flavour of the gin -, nor is bottling done on site as this is a noisy large scale industrial process, but apart from that Bombay Sapphire is to be congratulated in bringing this old industrial site back into use with refurbishment of the old, plus insertion of Thomas Heatherwick’s conservatories at the centre.

Suddenly, ahead, a monument appears which confirms the true power of North America.  On a plinth, a sculpture rises up, almost entirely of metal, some painted and some rusting, some circular and some pointed, some twisted and some straight, with the addition of a glass and rubber tyres.  The monument is a pick-up truck, the symbol of modern America, a gas-guzzling vehicle that has been taken apart and reassembled as a monument for the 21t century by the American artist Virginia Overton.

At the White Cube Gallery in Bermondsey. Overton shows her dexterity.  Autumn is coming; so in one gallery she has a log-stove burning, the crackling fire fuelled from a huge pile of logs (where on earth do they come from in the middle of London?), while adjacent are mirrored sculptures – the glass mirrors being both reflective and translucent, taken from a library in Columbus Ohio, held on marble supports, reflecting back the 1970’s green wallpaper from her own kitchen.

Overton takes different elements and combines them into new experiences, with which she draws in the viewer to interact and question perceptions of space, culture and the modern world.

Quietly, slowly, the explorers move across the empty barren space towards the doorway and, much to their surprise, when they push, the door opens to allow them inside into a clean modern environment, where regimented lighting strips guide the explorers to the inner sanctum. 

As they enter, large statues both stand in their way and guide them to other spaces.  They have entered a labyrinth of 15 chambers where god-like statues stand guard over the central space which, in contrast to tombs in South America or China, is full of 500 figures lying in all sorts of postures, celebrating life not death.

The jungle in Bermondsey in South London and Antony Gormley has created a new labyrinth at the White Cube Gallery.  At the heart, the Sleeping Field (2015-6) fills the central space with 517 cast-iron figures in a variety of relaxed.postures, all contemporary, as if on a seaside beach, while around it in the other chambers are works from the late 1980’s until 2016, standing guard like sentinels around the central space.  Concrete blocks, steel  and iron shapes all recreate the human form from the dimensions of Gormley’s own body, including “Passage” a tunnel formed with Gormley’s silhouette .through which the visitor can pass.  

An exhibition which not only shows Gormley’s newest works, along with some of his older ones, but which does so in a setting which recreates the atmosphere of those mysterious other environments, in the modern art gallery setting that characterises the White Cube.

Many of the best known modern and contemporary artists are here including Ai Weiwei with a huge coloured jar from 2006 and “Fairytale – 1001 Chairs” (2007), both showing traditional Chinese influences, Anselm Keifer’s characteristic lead ship “Odi Navali” (1997) and Ugo Rondinone’s smiling but sinister “SUNRISE.east.march” (2007). 

Several artists have works from different periods of their career, in particular Andy Warhol including his silvered Coca Cola bottle “You’re In” (1967) and Damien Hirst with his large 1998 installation “Figures in a Landscape”, his recognisable “Spot Painting” of 1992 and his lesser-known “17 sausages” (1993) plus one of his Biopsy Series with the complex inclusion of scalpel blades, shattered glass and religious medals (2008).  There is a wealth of other artists including Keith Haring, Bridget Riley, Alexander Calder, Dan Flavin, Gerhard Richter, Tim Noble and Sue Webster with their illuminated dollar sign (2004) (Warhol also has one of his dollar signs in the sale), Georg Baselitz, Elizabeth Frink, Yoshitomo Nara’s amusing “I think, Therefore I am…a Dog” (2003) and KAWS oversized Chinese toy “Companion Black” from 2007, Subodh Gupta’s “Black Thing” made from stainless steel pincers (2007) and David Noonan’s shadowy figure from 2008. 

The preview exhibition for the auction shows the huge variety of work and media in which 20th century and contemporary artists have  worked and continue to work.  The guide prices, determined by the market, however remain a fascinating and mysterious art in their own right.