Fidel Castro
Fidel Castro
Signed Photo “Con Hemingway 1960” with Fidel Castro - 1960
An iconic image by Cuban photographer Osvaldo Salas captures a timeless moment between two legends—Ernest Hemingway and Fidel Castro—in May 1960, the only time the two ever met. While living in Cuba, Hemingway had sponsored a fishing tournament in which both men participated. As The New Yorker described it:
“There are numerous photographs of that meeting, but nothing noteworthy in the words that were exchanged before witnesses—mere formalities, really.” Life magazine published one of those photographs along with a record of an exchange between Castro, who won the competition, and Hemingway, who awarded him the trophy: “‘I am a novice at fishing,’ said Fidel. ‘You are a lucky novice,’ replied Ernest.”
This 13″ x 19″ silver gelatin print is from that original 1960 negative by Osvaldo Salas, printed by his son Roberto Salas. Titled and dated on recto “Con Hemingway 1960.” Editioned “Artist Copy” and signed “Roberto Salas / Habana” in black ink on verso, blind embossed with official Salas Gallery imprint and copyright.
After Hemingway’s death his wife Mary donated their beloved Finca Vigía home—where he wrote most of For Whom the Bell Tolls and The Old Man and The Sea—to the Cuban people. Castro had since turned the home into a museum honoring the great writer, which stands to this day as Havana’s most popular tourist attraction.
OSVALDO SALAS (1914-1992) is widely recognized as having been one of the world’s great press photographers. His international fame came not just from the quality of his work but also because he was so often in the right place at the right time. He received many awards, diplomas and honors for his photography, including being acclaimed, in 1983, an International Master of Photography by the International Press Association.
Roberto Salas
Born in New York in 1940, ROBERTO SALAS has been living and working in Havana since 1959. Invited to Cuba personally by Fidel Castro, Roberto has documented the revolution from the Sierra Maestro to the Bay of Pigs, later serving as a U.N. correspondent and war correspondent in South East Asia, both in Cambodia and Vietnam, where he spent a year behind Vietcong lines. Like his father’s, Roberto’s images are beautifully crafted. His extraordinary ability to capture the humility and courage of the Cuban people during the momentous decades of the revolution is an invitation into the heart of Cuba.