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What is "Inventar"?
What is "Inventar"?
The Soviet Union's fall in 1991 led to economic downturn known as the Cuban Special Period, during which building materials and real estate grew scare. The populace adapted the architectural phenomena of "Inventar" through which "new housing spaces and structures are quite literally 'invented' through the improvised acquisition of goods” (Del Real and Pertierra 78).
Figure 1:
Figure 1:
(Foo).
Barbacoas
Barbacoas
In urban areas, the bounds of the existing buildings limited the principles of "Inventar" to the subdivision of space. Many residents built barbacoas, "platform[s] constructed in the interior of an existing space, more often in the interior of Colonial buildings in the old city center and other buildings with similar spatial typology” (Del Real and Pertierra 82). Architectural designer Charisse Foo demonstrates these balseros, or lofts, in the illustration in figure 1. The top half of the illustration shows a colonial style mansion from the outside, while the bottom half peels away the façade to reveal the interior levels which are subdivided by lofts. The contrast between the exterior and interior of the mansion emphasizes the internal, hidden quality of these lofts.
The barbacoa's role in political resistance emerges in Antonio José Ponte's short story, "A Knack for Making Ruins", as the repurposing of the space resists political and economic constraints on infrastructure.
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