Cuba is not only a travel destination for many, but is also repeatedly in the focus of world events, especially when the former dictator Fidel Castro died in 2016. Now Slanted Publishers has published a photo book on Fidel Castro's 90th birthday "Cuba - 90 años fidel", which shows the most diverse places in Cuba during the period of his birthday - with a foreword by jazz pianist Marialy Pacheco.

"We Cubans never leave Cuba completely when we emigrate. We carry our island around with us forever wherever we go. Cuba embodies our culture, our way of being, our way of seeing things, Cuba is more than a country. The Caribbean island is our philosophy of life."

This is how the internationally renowned Cuban jazz pianist Marialy Pacheco describes the Cubans' attitude to life in the foreword to the book "CUBA - 90 years of Fidel Castro". The Caribbean state was shaped by the legendary revolution of the Castro brothers and their friend Chef Guevara, the victory over the dictator Fulgencio Batista and the annexation of revolutionary Cuba to the Eastern Bloc. This socialist enclave has existed for over 50 years, 144 kilometres off the coast of Florida. The pictures of the internationally awarded photographer Dirk Gebhardt show the reader Cuban realities of life away from the usual tourist images and thus open up the reality of the Cubans in a colourful and compassionate way. With improvisation, idealism and "laissez fair" the Cubans try to overcome the economic shortage, to defy the heat and to keep up their ideals.

The book shows 75 pictures from various places in Cuba. From Remedios, Trinidad and Havana to Viñales in the west of the country. All pictures were taken in the summer of 2016, the period of celebration of Fidel Castro's 90th birthday. The pictures are juxtaposed with typical Cuban propaganda slogans and statements by Cubans critical of the regime. It is in this field of tension that the message of the book develops: the life of the Cubans is not what we think it is.

The book is published in a limited edition of 250 signed copies. It has 166 pages with 75 photographs, a preface by Marialy Pacheco and an epilogue by Dirk Gebhardt.