Abascal, Pedro

A self-taught photographer, in the early 1980s he participated in various workshops on the history of photography, manipulated photography and alternative image processes. Professionally, he has worked as a photojournalist, advertising photographer and still photographer for films. He has served on the jury of the National Photography Salon and the National Prize of Plastic Arts. He has held solo exhibitions in Cuba, the United States, and Switzerland. He has also participated in numerous group exhibitions in Cuba, Mexico, Brazil, the United States, Spain, Italy, Germany, England, Denmark, France, Norway, China, Malaysia, and Africa. In 1996, he received a Special Mention at the Casa de las Américas Photographic Essay Prize for his essay "Wings in the Shadow," about the lives and educational development of blind and visually impaired children. He has given lectures, masterclasses, and conducted workshops at various universities and cultural institutions in the United States. Abascal is a renowned exponent of contemporary Cuban photography; with a distinctive sense of observation and acute sensitivity, he transcends the limits of the anecdotal and descriptive by infusing his work with a high symbolic charge, achieving pieces of great beauty, expressive power and a distinctive personal stamp. His work has been published in several anthologies of photography and visual arts, both nationally and internationally, including "Canto a la Realidad: Antología de La Fotografía Latinoamericana 1860-1993," "Proyecto Memoria," "Viva La Vida," and "100 años de Fotografía Cubana," among others. In 2003, he published a monographic essay on his documentary work titled "Personal Documents." Some of his pieces are part of public and private collections in Cuba, Mexico, France, Italy, the Netherlands, and in important educational institutions, galleries and museums in the United States.