Despite having been a faithful supporter of Fidel Castro during the early years of the Cuban Revolution—even settling on the island between 1961 and 1965—, Paolo Gasparini has distanced his position from the socialist project.

The photographer always found evident parallelisms between the devotion to saints and that which is professed—even within the domestic sphere—to the martyrs of revolution. This photograph portrays a street in Havana in which a passerby contemplates the framed portrait of Ernesto Che Guevara hanging from the façade of a building, reminding us of the popular chapels that can be found outside of people’s houses in Catholic countries. Che had died in the Bolivian jungle in 1967 while supporting a guerrilla stronghold in the Andean country. Over time his images have been transformed into a widely reproduced icon on both sides of the iron curtain.

Gasparini also worked for the Consejo Nacional de Cultura de Cuba and was commissioned by UNESCO to document the ambitious alphabetization programs that were being carried out in the country. Nevertheless, his photographic style differed greatly from standard political propaganda which usually focused on the parades and mass gatherings revolving around political leaders.