Introduction | Korda's Che Moves Out into the World

The Making of a Portrait
On the morning of March 4th 1960 the French Freighter Le Coubre exploded in Havana Harbor with over seventy tons of Belgium ammunition on board killing eighty-one people; the leadership of the Cuban revolution assumed this was the work of the CIA and sabotage. Castro called for a mass funeral which soon became a mass demonstration. It was a critical moment in the political evolution of the revolution in Cuba. Aware of the constant possibility of American intervention and the fragility of the emerging nation, the Cuban government turned for the first time toward the Soviet Union for military support.

During the funeral at Havana's Colòn cemetery facing a sea of people, <1> President Fidel Castro gave his oration from a platform which included Cuban dignitaries as well as visiting French intellectuals, Simone de Beauvoir and Jean Paul Sartre: down below amidst the people, listening to the speeches was Fidel's personal photographer, Alberto Dìaz Guttièrez (1928-2001) who was known as "Korda." Before the revolution he had been an eminent fashion photographer and was now documenting events in his country from the perspective of its new leadership. During Castro's speech, on the platform, just for a few seconds-no longer-Che Guevara came into view; he looked out over the enormous crowd. Korda described what has now become the famous gaze of Che as encabronado y dolente (angry and sad). Korda snapped two frames with his Leica before Guevara disappeared from sight. <2>

Korda recalling the moment stated:
"I remember it as if it were today: seeing him framed in
the view finder; with that expression; I am still startled by the
impact... [it] shakes me so powerfully."

Quoted in David Kunzle,
Che Guevara: Icon, Myth and Message. p. 58.

Korda had been on assignment for Revoluciòn, the Cuban daily newspaper, although the image was not included in the following day's report. Yet, noting the image on his contact sheet, Korda made a small print for himself; a cropped portrait and pinned it up on his studio wall. Many visitors passed through the studio and saw the image but it is unknown how many prints Korda made or gave to visitors from different countries during these years, prints which could have formed the basis for the dissemination of the image.

It was not until 1986 that Josè Figueroa an established photographer in his own right who printed for Korda and was his unofficially "adopted" son, suggested they try printing the full frame version of the portrait. The full frame image revealing a more statuesque vision of Che, however Korda continued to print both versions of the image up until his death. <3>

One Version of the Narrative
In the spring of 1967, Italian publisher Giangiacomo Feltrinelli visited Cuba where he had obtained the rights to publish Chè's Bolivian Diary. Feltrinelli was looking for an image for the cover of Bolivian Diary and was advised to visit the studio of Alberto Korda. Korda recalls that he gave two prints of the cropped portrait to Feltrinelli as a gift. Within six months Chè had been assassinated in Bolivia. Feltrinelli having returned to Italy published the image as a large poster crediting the copyright to (c) Libreria Feltrinelli 1967 (in the lower left hand corner of the image) with no mention to Korda. <4> Feltrinelli himself died in 1972. Various theories surrounding Feltrinelli's death include suicide, that he accidentally blew himself up while engaged in planting a bomb outside Milan, and that he was the victim of a fascist assassination.

Until recently the first publications of this image in Europe were assumed to have been reproduced only after Che's death and that Feltrinelli was the probable source of their reproduction. Feltrinelli's version of the image was certainly used in October in Milan 1967 when spontaneous protests occurred in response to the news of Che's death:

The first time I saw a picture by Alberto Korda I was not even slightly interested in the author. I was only fifteen, and it was the picture that had drawn us - many for the first time-to gather in the streets, crying "Che lives!" I could not know then, that I would also become a photographer, nor that twenty years later I would meet the author of the portrait. It is indeed curious that it would take so long, and that I would travel so much to Cuba before meeting Alberto. Yet the reasons for my travels often related to the Guerrillo Heroico, for study, work, and private interest. And the famous portrait hung in my bedroom as a teenager.

Giorgio Mondolfo, quoted in The 150th Anniversary of Photography, catalogue, an exhibition curated by Guiliana Scimè, Pier Paolo Pasolini, 1988.

Korda always said that Feltrinelli produced over a million posters and then sold them, while the Feltrinelli publishing house has argued that they were produced only to promote Che's Bolivian Diary. Korda was never credited for the image and never received any payment for its reproduction, and unlike others who later copied the image, Feltrinelli personally knew who actually was the author of the image. Few of these posters remain in existence but their dissemination in Europe at the critical juncture of the Prague Spring, the Uprisings in Paris, and the Civil Rights Movement in Ireland of the late 60s, assisted in the process whereby this image traversed the visual terrain from merely a portrait of a hero to a key symbol of radical thought.

The Korda Che in Europe before his Death
Until an issue of Paris Match from August 19, 1967 surfaced those who have studied the history of the Korda photograph Guerrillo Heroico assumed that the photograph was not seen in Europe until after Che's death. <5> This issue of Paris Match features a major article, "Les Guèrilleros" by French journalist Jean Lartèguy, author of the novel Mercenaires, who the magazine describes as "recently back from guerilla controlled areas in South America." Lartèguy writes, "At a time when Cuban revolutionaries want to create Vietnams all over the world, the Americans run the risk of finding their own Algeria in Latin America."

Lartèguy then asks, "Where is Che Guevara?" The eleven page article reproduces Korda's photograph as "the official photograph of Che Guevara; on his beret the star, the symbol of Commandante. A high position in the Cuban army, only Fidel Castro held a position of more importance." Che Guevara was murdered less than ten weeks after this article was published. It is not known where this image came from, however it is not credited to Feltrinelli.

"I wanted the image to breed like rabbits." Jim Fitzpatrick Irish artist Jim Fitzpatrick states that he published a poster using the Korda Che image before Che was murdered. His own fascination with Guevara stemmed both from his respect for the rebel, who reminded him of the protagonists of the 1916 Uprising in Ireland, and because he had once met Che who had stopped in County Claire while traveling in Ireland from Cuba en route to the then Soviet Union. Guevara like many Argentineans claimed Irish heritage, his grandmother Ana Isabel Lynch's family had come originally from County Galway during the Potato Famine to settle in Argentina.

Fitzpatrick claims he received a copy of the photograph from the Dutch anarchist group, the Provos who produced a magazine named after their group in 1965 and were in part the inspiration of Roel Van Duyn a former window cleaner and performance artist influenced by Herbert Marcuse and the Marquis de Sade. Fitzpatrick remembers that Provo magazine claimed the image originally came to Europe via Jean Paul Sartre. Fitzpatrick source of the image, then, was not Feltrinelli.

It is not possible at this time to endorse or refute this claim. What is true is that Sartre was present at the funeral when the image was taken and also traveled into the interior of Cuba to Santiago with Simone de Beauvoir, Fidel Castro and Korda in the same car. It is possible that Korda might well have given a copy of the portrait to Sartre in 1960. However Korda's daughter Diana Diaz does not recall her father mentioning this and nor does his friend and colleague Josè Figueroa who printed most of the images for Korda. Figueroa says the trip with Sartre was very hurried and most probably Korda did not have the time to present him with a photograph.

Fitzpatrick produced a variety of posters in 1967 using the Korda image, the most well known was printed on silver foil and was exhibited in an exhibition in London called Viva Che at the Arts Laboratory, curated by Peter Mayer. <6> This show was originally to be held at the Lisson Gallery in 1968 and illustrates how fast the image moved from protest into the realm of the fine art.

Fitzpatrick reproduced his posters in large numbers. He had no knowledge at the time who had taken the original photograph. He never claimed any copyright and never sold the image; his only interest in the portrait was his admiration for Guevara and his own interest in social change and justice.

First Publication in Cuba
Two tear sheets from original newspapers held in the archives of the newspaper Revoluciòn, Havana, show what is thought to be the first reproductions of the Korda Che. <7> They promote the conference "La industrializacion en Cuba" with Dr. Ernesto Guevara, the Minister of Industry, as the main speaker. The conference was scheduled to begin on April 16th 1961 at noon but was disrupted when 1300 CIA supported counter-revolutionaries stormed the beaches of Cuba in what would be a failed invasion, known as the Bay of Pigs. Che immediately left the conference. On April 28th a second advertisement appeared in Revoluciòn, announcing the rescheduling of the conference for Sunday 30th of April 1961. It seems very likely that in the context of these publications that Che would have seen the photograph.

First Poster to be Printed in Cuba on the News of Che's murder Frèmez, Josè Gòmez Fresquet the renowned Cuban poster maker and graphic artist recalled how on hearing the news of Guevara's death he worked all night producing this poster to be used at the rally honoring Che which was held in The Plaza de la Revoluciòn on the 18th of October. <8> Korda had given him a copy of the portrait as a basis for the poster. Using the printing press of the Consejo Nacional de Cultura, Fremèz recalls that he could barely believe the news and attributed the "faint dots of the screen appearing and reappearing" as symbolic. There was no time to use more than one color for the poster and only red paper was available. This was the first privately made poster in Cuba commemorating the death of Che. Fremèz's recollection appears in David Kunzle's Che Guevara: Icon, Myth and Message. p. 59.

The First Officially Commissioned Poster
The first official poster to be commissioned by the Cuban state to commemorate the death of Che Guevara is by Niko (Antonio Pèrez González). <9> A graduate of History of the Art in the University of Havana. Niko studied at ICAIC in 1968 designed posters for foreign and Cuban films and political posters as part of the revolutionary campaigns of the '60s and '70s. This was one of his first and most influential works. He resides in Mexico.

The "Warhol" Che
Andy Warhol biographer and art critic David Bourdon writes: "While in Rome [in 1967: Gerard] Malanga, running short on money, forged a series of 'Warhols'- silk screened images based on a news photograph of the dead Cuban leader Che Guevara. <10> He made two phony paintings, gave one to a girl friend and offered the other for sale-priced at $3,000-through a Rome gallery; in a February 1968 exhibition at that gallery, he also showed signed and numbered silkscreen prints from an edition of fifty, priced at fifty dollars. When the dealer sought to verify the provenance of the 'Warhol' Guevaras, Malanga wrote to Warhol, explaining that if the works were not authenticated, the poet would be 'denounced-Italian style' and thrown into jail. Malanga enclosed a newspaper review of the show, commenting, 'Andy, this is the first time that your art work has been praised by the Communist press.' 'What nerve!' Warhol remarked. Not one to be outwitted, he wired back, authenticating the paintings but stipulating that all monies were to be sent directly to him as 'Mr. Malanga was not authorized to sell the artwork.'"

Jonathan Green writes:
"While Warhol did not initiate the silkscreen, this Che nonetheless reflected the essential tenants that underwrote Pop Art's culture and ideology and help provide the definitive transformation of Che Guevara from heroic guerilla to pop celebrity. It accomplished this not only because of social content but because of artistic technique. Pop Art itself is a rejection of traditional figuration, rhetoric, and rendition. Its egalitarian anti-art stance was the perfect corollary for Che's anti-establishment attitude. Pop's depersonalization and standardization simplified Che's image and help aligned him with the masses at the same time certifying his image as everyman. Traditional art relished ambiguity, chance, introspection, and the logic of uncertainty. Pop's aesthetic pushed toward absolutely unambiguous and uninflected meaning, repeatability and uniformity. This reduction of the real world provides the perfect vehicle for distancing the image from the complexities and ambiguities of actual life and the reduction of the political into stereotype. Che lives in these images as an ideal abstraction."

Chesucristo:
The Christification of Che I am no Christ, nor a philanthropist. I am the very opposite of Christ....I will fight with all the arms within reach instead of letting myself be nailed to a cross. Letter from Che to his mother from his Mexican jail, 1956.

In Che Guevara: Icon, Myth and Message,
David Kunzle writes:
"What external similarities and differences does the historical record show between the passions of Che and Christ? <11> Both died young, in their thirties. Both were betrayed like so many martyrs by those who should have supported them (Jesus by his disciple Judas and the crowd at his Presentation, Che by the Bolivian peasants and Communist party.) Both were mocked by and insulted by soldiers after capture, and suffered despoliation of their paltry belongings after death. Both were exhibited in public to be reviled, in a manipulated public response, with two other victims. Both were executed in the military manner appropriate to the age as seditionists. In some respects, however, Jesus was treated better than Che, which says a lot about our present level of civility; Jesus was given a trial with some legal trappings, even if not a fair one. Che was murdered, period, without the merest show of a trial, which would have risked garnering worldwide sympathy....And above all Jesus' family was allowed to take the body down from the Cross and bury it decently. Che's body was quickly "disappeared" in order to prevent mourning, reverence or the germination of myth."

Trisha Ziff
January 2005