Gio Montez’s action witnesses a symbolic passage in Cuban history, coinciding with the lifting of the long-standing embargo that had imposed political, economic, and cultural isolation for more than six decades. Conceived as a conceptual and material gesture, the action reflects on Cuba’s transition from enforced stasis toward an uncertain engagement with the global system. At its core is Black Cloud, a ready-made installation in which Montez captured carbon dioxide emitted by a 1930s automobile still circulating in Havana, sealing it within a glass jar and transporting it to Europe as an archaeological relic of a suspended era. Through this and related works from the Incubation cycle, Montez adopts a neo-Dadaist approach that positions art as a tool of preservation and critical memory, capable of transforming ephemeral traces of history into reflective instruments for understanding a society in transition.
