Habaneros People Of Havana

Photography book.

Description:

Havana may be one of the poorest cities in the world but Michael Heffernan’s lyrical street-life photographs argue that in terms of its human resources the Cuban capital is rich. British photographer Heffernan made his name as a photojournalist with a book on London’s homeless, produced to raise money for the charity Shelter, and the same empathic eye has dicovered layers of Cuban society which the tourist images of classic cars and cigar vendors have neglected.

Heffernan’s lens zooms past Ché and Castro to focus on a game of draughts played on an ancient board, a group of boys hanging out by the waterside or a small boy wearing giant boxing gloves. Given the anticipated change in Cuban culture when Castro dies, Heffernan’s documentation of the daily rhythms and mores of the habaneros forms a valuable record of a threatened way of life.