Herman Puig
Herman Puig was the founder of the first Cinemateca de Cuba and a pioneer of male nude photography. Born in Havana, Cuba, he began his career there and later gained fame in France. His heritage is Catalonian.
Biography
Early years
He studied painting and sculpture in Cuba and filmed his first short, "Sarna," before moving to Paris at the age of 20 to study Audiovisual Techniques. In 1950, he worked with Henri Langlois, director and co-founder of the Cinémathèque Française. This collaboration led to the founding of the original Cinemateca de Cuba, officially established as an institution in 1948 by Herman Puig and Ricardo Vigón. The Cinemateca de Cuba was later revived in 1961 by Alfredo Guevara and the newly formed ICAIC, becoming today's Cuba Cinemateca.Puig, along with Carlos Franqui, future ICAIC cameraman Ramón F. Suárez, and writers Edmundo Desnoes and Guillermo Cabrera Infante, produced several short films. Puig and Franqui collaborated on a short film, Carta de una madre, and Puig and Edmundo Desnoes also made the short film Sarna, which was produced and edited by cinematographer Ramón F. Suárez.
Cinema to Male Nude Photography
In October 1950, Puig traveled to Paris, where he met with Henri Langlois, the director of the Cinémathèque Française. Their brief but pivotal encounter led Langlois to agree to provide French films for the Cinema Club of Havana, on the condition that the club become an official institution. The Cinémathèque Française could only legally exchange films with similar institutions. Unforeseen political issues led to the closure of the Cinemateca a few months later, and it would not reopen until 1961. However, Puig's affinity for France and his place in Cuban cinema history were firmly established.From the 1960s to the 1970s, Puig worked in advertising as a photographer and publicity filmmaker in Spain. In Madrid, he began experimenting with male nudes but was arrested in an alleged drug case and charged as a pornographer under the socialist government’s climate. He then moved to Paris to prove to Spain and the world that he was an artist, not a pornographer, and was met with almost universal acclaim. He later moved to Barcelona, where he resides to this day.