The founders of the Tanit Ethnographic Museum, José Ferrer and his wife, the painter Remedios de Quintana, have spent 10 days in Cuba, from March 27 to April 6. During these holidays, for three days, they have participated in the Canaricaiguán 2008 tobacco festival, held in Cabaiguán, Cuba. "It was a very endearing festival because we found that 90 percent of the population were descendants of Canarians, they even gave us letters to bring to their relatives," says Remedios de Quintana.
José Ferrer and the painter were invited by the writer and founder of the Ethnographic Museum of Cabaiguán, Mario Luis López. There, Ferrer presented his work "A Lanzarote native overseas", a book in which he collects the history of his great-uncle José Parrilla, who traveled through Cuban lands in the service of the Spanish crown as a judge. Likewise, Remedios de Quintana participated in an exhibition with other Cuban painters at the Casa Canaria de Cabaiguán. The founder of the Tanit Ethnographic Museum gave a painting of the Mountains of Fire to this institution and a work of Las Salinas to the Ethnographic Museum of this place.
Also, at the headquarters of the Casa Canaria de Cabaiguán a floral offering was made on the occasion of the 150th anniversary of Doña Leonor Pérez, a native of the Canary Islands and mother of the revolutionary José Martí Pérez. In this tobacco festival there was no lack of the twinning of typical Canarian dances and the Cuban punto. "What caught my attention the most is that the children made Canarian meals that the elders taught them in the associations they had and they made us a carnival omelette that they distributed among the public," explains Quintana.
This festival also had the attendance of the Deputy Minister of Emigration and Cooperation of the Canary Islands Government, the president of the Canary Islands Houses in Cuba and other Canarian and Cuban authorities.
Once these three days of celebrations were over, the founders of the Tanit Ethnographic Museum toured Cuba, this being a trip that for Remedios de Quintana has left an indelible mark, which she remembers with great affection and of which she highlights that above all it has been "very enriching".
