The work of Alfredo Manzo Cedeño delights us for its brilliant craftsmanship, witty commentary on recognizable types or individuals, and its observation about celebrity. Yet it also raises questions about the definition of art. Can these papier-mâché figures of baseball players be art?

Manzo pays homage to and continues the tradition of the portrayal of athletes as ideals of the human form. Examples from Classical Greece abound. The Aristogeiton by Kritios and Nesiotes(i) stands ready to duel. His musculature and stance of readiness are the proof of his reflection of divinity. In this period, the figure is perfect and the pose one of balance. In the Hellenistic Period, the sense of motion is allowable, and balance is replaced by dynamism, and the figure is more particularized. In general, in the emphasis on the specific rather than the ideal, and in the variety of postures, Manzo is closer to his Hellenistic colleagues. The Jockey(ii) of this period thrusts forward, like some of Manzo's pitchers balanced just before releasing the ball.

And what about this abject material? We can accept athletes in bronze or marble, but this is paper bags and glue. Cuba has an important tradition of papier-mâché, one articulated by Antonia Eiriz(iii), who taught that it was a natural medium of expression for the Cuban artist, and made extraordinary works in this medium. The medium allows for detailed modeling since the glue-soaked paper is malleable and workable with simple tools. The skilled artist in this medium has the possibility of dominating the material in a way that stone cannot be, since it is additive rather than subtractive. In stone, a wrong move with the mallet and the stone is gone, and so is the detail.

The availability of the material is relevant in Cuba, where a process such as bronze casting is not common, in part due to scarcity of materials and expense. Papier-mâché requires no wax model, no mold, no furnace. It is direct.

His studio, shared with several other artists who work in this medium, is the enclosed rooftop of the home of one of the artists. It is airy, open, always teeming with work in various stages of progress. The Cuban sense of the colectiva is beautifully exemplified in the camaraderie among these artists who support one another and sell their work together in the feria in Havana, in front of the Convento de San Carlos.

In November 1998, the works of Manzo and several of his compatriotas in the studio were included in the exhibition Jao Moch: Homenaje a Antonia Eiriz curated by Meira Marrero Díaz and José A. Toirac. The show sought to problematize what the curators saw as an artificial dichotomy between the high-art market and the feria, a place where artists sold their work in the street, directly to tourists and savvy collectors.

The total absence of pretension is the chief delineator between the high-art market and the feria. Manzo and others in the exhibition were brought into the discussion of art despite the institutionalized criteria based on imagery, material, but most important, venue for presentation.

But these artists made a choice to be in the feria. The directness and absence of theory allow them to make whatever they wish and to sell it on the spot, with no intermediaries. And they bring from the street to the studio a vitality that is palpable in the work. It calls a spade a spade. Art for sale is art for sale whether it is channeled through the most elegant gallery or set among ashtrays with Che Guevara's image on the bottom in the throng of booths and tourists.

If this sounds familiar, it should. Andy Warhol sought to pry open the same hermetic seal that separated high art from production. The very name of his studio, the Factory, puts it out there. It brings a skeptical eye to the ideas of uniqueness, and the divine touch of the artist-genius. Manzo pays homage to Warhol with his series 20 Campbell's and 1 Cuban. It replaces the soup cans with rows of ball players in Campbell's jerseys. Their faces are red, too, as if their identities and individuality have been subsumed by the branding, or team identity. The one Cuban is the most famous Cuban of all.(iv) It is one against the multitude, the Lider against the infinitely reproducible commodity.

Manzo, like Warhol, uses assistants to make the work. But unlike Warhol, the details are always by his hand. His detailed homage to the individual players is conveyed through his attention to every nuance of the features, the uniform, the stance. He inserts other commentary. The placement of the bat reflects machismo in the public sphere. In the Dugout(v), Manzo makes the team of the century, with details such as a picture of Marilyn Monroe behind Joe DiMaggio.

The art world, with its idiosyncrasies, is not very different from the baseball stadium. Favorite players, some over priced, some who survive celebrity and others that are derailed by it. The fragility of fame. The art world lacks the relative objectivity of sports statistics. It is even more subjective and arbitrary. But once the analogy is rooted, the details of parallels emerge. The stable is analogous to the bullpen. Even the barnyard terminology fits both sites.

In the works in this exhibition, Manzo has created individual figures, portraits of specific players. In other works, not shown here, he creates the dream team of the Dugout. In a work that parodies the persistent use of the balsero as one of the handful of images that collectors seek, Manzo has made a nicho for the Virgen de Caridad del Cobre, Ochún, the orisha of love and sexuality and the patron saint of Cuba. The story of this saint is that she appeared to a trio of three fishermen caught in a storm at sea, and her image rescued them. This image is one, like that of José Martí that is honored on both sides of the Straits of Florida. It is ensconced in the Hermitá de Caridad del Cobre in Miami, a chapel at the side of the sea where immigrants thank her for being placed on American real estate. Its Vatican is in Oriente, attracting pilgrims, including Pope John Paul.

In that image, the three fishermen are replaced by Orlando Hernández, "El Duque," the famous pitcher of the New York Yankees who left Cuba on a raft to find fame and much, much fortune. He arrives, not in a makeshift craft of inner tubes and found lumber, but skims past the apparition in a flashy speedboat.

In this work, Manzo arrays individual players. They recall the famous photograph by Alberto Korda showing the heroes of the Revolution. Manzo renders also the famous figures. The familiar icons are leached of their celebrity.

Like many Cuban artists, Manzo can tease both the Cuban and American clichés to render something new. He does so with astonishing craftsmanship, intelligence, wit, and great élan. For the love of the game. Either game.

-Marilyn Zeitlin

(i) 477-476 B.C., Roman copy, Naples National Museum.

(ii) 240-200 B.C., National Museum in Athens.

(iii) Antonia Eiriz (1929-1995).

(iv) When the first group of Cuban artists came to the ASU Art Museum in September 1998, Curator John Spiak informed them that the most famous Cuban in the United States was not Fidel Castro but Ricky Ricardo--- not even Desi Arnaz.

(v) 2000, collection of the ASU Art Museum, gift of Mikki and Stanley Weithorn and Elaine and Sidney Cohen.