University of Miami Special Report: Cuba and the Caribbean

Cuba & The Caribbean Special Report

  • The Environment
    • A Museum of Marine Life
    • Exploring Energy Options for Cuba
    • Working Together to Build a Sustainable Future
    • Influencing Hurricane Intensity
    • Finding Keys to Coral Survival
    • A Pregnancy Exam for Jaws
    • Protecting Flora, Fauna, and Humans in the Caribbean Biological Corridor
    • Father of Dust
    • Science as Diplomacy
  • The People
    • A Conversation with Yoani Sánchez
    • – Conversando con Yoani Sánchez
    • A Unique Cultural Perspective
    • – Una Perspectiva Cultural Única
    • Unearthing the Mysteries of the Caribbean
    • El Mar y Él
    • Helping Hands in Haiti
    • Tracing Circuitous Lines of the Black LGBTQ Experience
    • Student Organizations Embrace Caribbean Culture
    • A Winning Team
    • Exploring Shipwrecks in the Caribbean
    • Language and the Negotiation of Identities
    • Cuban Lecturer Inspires Students through Stories of Resilience
    • Chinese Influences on Life and Religion in Cuba
    • A Chinese-Cuban Secret Society in Havana
  • Business & Economy
    • Restoring Cuba’s Historic Infrastructure
    • Serving the Underserved in Dominican Republic
    • A Bright Future for Caribbean Fish
    • A Close Look at Cuba’s Health Care System
    • Studying Caribbean Currency
    • Haiti After Hurricane Matthew
  • Health Care
    • Sharing Ideas Amid a Changing Culture
    • Cuba Water Hassles
    • Sharing Insights On Trauma Care
    • Delaying Motherhood for Childhood
    • There’s Something in the Waters of Puerto Rico’s Guánica Bay
    • Health Care in Haiti
    • Missions of Mercy
    • Transforming Nursing Education in Guyana
    • Creative Insight on Cuba’s Wastewater System
    • A ‘Living Laboratory’ for Studying Multiple Sclerosis
    • A Hemispheric Approach to Bioethics and Health Policy
    • Campeche and UM Join Hands to Improve Public Health
    • Comparative Studies Could Identify IBD ‘Triggers’
    • A Close Look at Cervical Cancer in Haitian Women
  • Politics & Policy
    • A Renewed, Tenuous Relationship
    • A Trusted Ally for Leftists
    • GTMO: Mayberry with a Caribbean Breeze
    • On the Frontlines of Immigration
    • Marrying Science and Policy in The Bahamas
  • Arts & Culture
    • A UM Architect’s Connection to Cuba
    • Digital Home for Cuban Theater
    • Football Flashback: ‘Canes vs. Cuba
    • An Interdisciplinary Hemispheric Collaboration
    • Exploring Architectural Wonders
    • Sanctuaries Reveal ‘Otherworldly’ Past
    • Unexpected Reception
    • Connections to the Past
    • Havana: The ‘Rome of the New World’
    • The Lowe Features Caribbean Art
    • A Musician Grows in Cuba
    • Afro-Cuban Religion: Surviving and Thriving Underground
    • The Musical Divide of Charismatic Worship in Haiti
    • Impresiones: Sights and Sounds from Travels in Cuba
    • The Fruits of Caribbean Literary Studies
    • Jazz Cubano!
  • Centers & Institutes
    • ICCAS: A Hub for Information on Cuba at the University of Miami
    • Abess Center: Saving Coral Reefs
    • CCS: Hemispheric Collaboration
    • – CCS: Colaboración Hemisférica
    • UMIA: Collaborative Scholarship in the Americas
    • CCS: Using Computational Mapping to Communicate Culture
    • CHC: A Collection of Historical Gems
    • – CHC: La “joya” de las Colecciones Cubanas
    • UMIA: A Hub for Caribbean Research
    • UM Hillel: Connecting to Jewish Cuba
    • UM Hillel: A Vibrant Patronato, the Cuban Jewish Community
    • UM Hillel: Student Perspectives from Cuba
    • ‘Cane Talks: Examining the Culture of Cuba

Havana: The ‘Rome of the New World’

Havana: Rome of the New World
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UM architecture professor has deep roots to Cuba and its unique architecture.

For someone whose curiosity was piqued as a child interested in how garbage cans function, Victor Deupi, a lecturer at the University of Miami’s School of Architecture, has evolved his architectural enthusiasm to educate on the importance of Cuban architecture through exhibits and tours of the island.

Deupi’s passion stems from both his roots and his early research on 18th century architecture in Europe.

“Eighteenth century Rome is much like the Rome you see today,” says Deupi, recently elected president of the CINTAS Foundation, which promotes the professional development of Cuban architects, writers, musicians, and visual artists. “When you are in the center of Rome, you are in an 18th century city that has 2000 years of history.”

His early research on 18th century architecture in Rome, Spain and Italy allowed him to study the differences between the buildings in European countries and the small island of Cuba.

“When you step into Havana, you’re in a city that has 500 years of new world architecture and very little has changed since the 1950s,” Deupi says. “Havana is the Rome of the New World, simply put.”

About the Photo

Reminiscent of Spanish and Roman city squares, Old Havana’s Plaza de la Catedral invites people to gather around, eat, talk and linger. Photo credit: Peter E. Howard

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Born in Washington, D.C., his parents left Cuba after completing a degree in architecture and the revolution forced them to work for the government. His father told stories about the resorts in Varadero, the clubs in Havana and the “golden era” of Cuba. Deupi’s mother’s maternal family had “humble beginnings,” working on a farm outside Matanzas, before his mother was born and raised in Havana.

Victor Deupí, lecturer at the UM School of Architecture and recently elected president of the CINTAS Foundation.
Victor Deupi, lecturer at the UM School of Architecture and recently elected president of the CINTAS Foundation.

His maternal grandfather worked in the Bacardi offices in Havana, considered one of the most important architectural buildings of the 20th century because it “conveyed the same kind of modernity that the Chrysler building had in New York,” explains Deupi.

On the other side of the family, his paternal grandfather, Jose Deupi, was both a friend and gambler for the famous novelist, Ernest Hemingway.

While teaching at the University of Notre Dame in the 2000s, Deupi learned about academic licenses as a way to take students to Cuba.

“I realized, ‘Here’s my chance and way to begin this love with the island in a way that I couldn’t previously,’” he says.

During his first trip to Cuba with students from Notre Dame, they not only studied the city and buildings of Havana but also went to the city of Trinidad—about 200 miles southeast of the capital—to get a sense of a “colonial city in addition to the capital city.”

Since then, Deupi has returned to Cuba several times to lead cultural groups and architectural tours.

Deupi left Indiana in 2006 for Connecticut, and then moved to Miami three years ago. In South Florida, he's met other Cuban and Cuban-American architects. He’s worked with them to compile an archive of Cuban architecture and created an exhibit that opened at the Coral Gables Museum in late 2016, Cuban Architects at Home & In Exile: The Modernist Generation, with UM Architecture Professor Jean-Francois Lejeune.

“The long-term project is to build the archives of Cuban architecture and make it digital, making it available to the entire world. Right now, that does not exist.”

In sharing his love for and educating on Cuban architecture, Deupi highlights the continual exchange of ideas and art between the island and its neighbors near and far.

“The idea of re-thinking Cuban architecture, not as something that happened in Cuba, but as something that happens globally wherever Cubans go is really important.”

Deupi also lectures at the University of Miami’s School of Architecture to continue his interests in Cuban architecture with students and colleagues.

“What better place to do it than here, in Miami?” he says.

- ALINA ZERPA / UM News

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