( 1959, Havana (Cuba) )

Marta María Pérez Bravo is a Cuban artist, best known for her black-and-white photography based on dreams, often using her own body as the central subject to express her mythological beliefs.

Pérez Bravo graduated in Painting from the San Alejandro National Academy of Fine Arts in 1979 and from the Higher Institute of Art in 1984. While studying painting at both institutions, she did a photography project for her thesis and has worked on it ever since. She lived in Havana until 1995, when she moved to Monterrey, Mexico.

Her work usually consists of small-format black-and-white photographs, in which she uses her body as a means of expressing her religious and cultural perspective. She is deeply connected to her cultural heritage, especially the religious beliefs of Caribbean-African Santería. Santería considers that divinity is found in all things, even everyday objects. These objects are usually “votive offerings and other elements of popular knowledge” from Cuban culture. This is why Bravo chooses familiar objects such as clothing, tree branches, and animals to express the divine nature of all things. Her photographs tend to express her own spiritual journey, documenting her progress through abstractions and dreams in photographs.

A large part of her work also consists of self-portraits that are intended to demystify motherhood by showing her body in ways that challenge the cult of beauty. Her challenges in childbirth served as inspiration for her series called “Conception” and “Memories of Our Baby.” One method she uses to achieve this is to depict her body in circumstances of physical violence.

Bravo’s work has been exhibited around the world, including at the IV Havana Biennial, the V Istanbul Biennial in Turkey, and the Kwangju Biennial in South Korea. His work can also be found in many museum exhibitions, such as: