Old Havana
Havana is rebuilding. Scaffolding is seen all over the old city. Some decaying buildings get restored while others are demolished and replaced with modern office and apartment blocks.
Havana was once called “the city of columns”. I would call it “the city of statues” because they are everywhere. Statues can stand in the open…
or be hidden in an obscure corner like the sculptural group below.
Some statues are dedicated to wide range of famous people from Mother Teresa to Dante Alighieri. Others depict local celebrities like Jose María López Lledín who was known as El Caballero de Paris. He was an educated person who was not quite right in the head and wandered around. The statue shows him walking the streets of Havana as he often did. The story of his life can be found here.
The next statue represents a fictional character, Cecilia Valdes, from a popular 19th-century book. Cecilia was a beautiful mulatta and an illegitimate daughter of a rich slave trader. She fell in love with her half-brother Leonardo and gave birth to their child. Both did not know that they were related. Leonardo forgets Cecilia. When he is about to marry a white woman, Cecilia arranges for his murder and goes to prison for that.
There is a lot more to post on this subject. Someone should write a book “Statues and legends of Havana”.
Amazing statues and wonderful stories! One cannot hear and see enough of them;)