Cahier volant (Flying Notebook), 2013.
Paper, wood, and cloth.
216 x 192 inches. Perez Art Museum Miami, FL
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“It is simply the story of a coming to consciousness, who I am,
who I want to be, some memories,
some plans, some fantasies, it is all of that pell-mell,
the Notebook of a return to the native land.”
Aimé Césaire
who I want to be, some memories,
some plans, some fantasies, it is all of that pell-mell,
the Notebook of a return to the native land.”
Aimé Césaire
Cahier Volant (Flying Notebook), 2013, was created for the 2013 Biennial of Contemporary Art (BIAC) in Martinique, which centered on the figure of Aimé Césaire, the seminal poet, politician, and theorist of the négritude movement in francophone literature. The work was commissioned as a centerpiece for one of the biennial’s primary venues: the grand, historic Schoelcher Library in Fort de France, which features soaring ceilings and a striking glass-domed roof. The work that resulted is a large, mixed-media kite that hangs from the ceiling, taking the form of a flying fish. Inspired in part by the biennial’s focus on the relationship between visual art and literature, Estevez incorporated photocopied pages from some of the artist personal journals that he has kept since he was a young boy. A set of binoculars provides visitors with a view of Estévez’s patchwork of handwritten texts and esoteric images, which in turn provide a glimpse into the artist’s most intimate musings and memories. As a child in Cuba, Estévez was an avid flyer of homemade kites. For the artist, the kite -and the flying fish as well- represents a vehicle for spiritual transcendence, a form of passage from the terrestrial world to the celestial plane. Both the kite and the flying fish also allude to the notions of journey and migration, suggesting an autobiographical link to the artist’s own experience of emigration from Cuba. The piece was exhibited at Centro Cultural Español Miami in 2018 and is part of the collection of Perez Art Museum Miami in Florida.