Five Points for Preserving Twentieth-Century Architecture. A Conservation Management Plan for the National Art Schools of Cuba

The National Art Schools of Cuba were designed immediately after the Castro revolution (1961–64) by Ricardo Porro, Vittorio Garatti, and Roberto Gottardi to accommodate the integrated teaching of various art forms: visual arts, theatre, music, dance, and ballet. Although the Schools are included in the WMF list of 100 most endangered sites (2000), the UNESCO Tentative List (2003), and the National Register of Monuments (2010), a scientific approach to their sustainable conservation has long been lacking. The conservation plan prepared between 2018 and 2020 includes five lines of action: documentation, architectural preservation, landscape protection, environmental sustainability, and management. The plan has developed a clear list of priorities and practical solutions to the most urgent needs, such as the conservation of concrete and the adaptive reuse of abandoned parts, also in combination with themes that are ancillary to architecture but are also essential to its survival, such as the risk of flooding. The plan also discussed the “statement of significance” of this architectural masterpiece, involving different stakeholders (designers, owners, users) and other points of view (local, national, and international). In this way, the writing of the CMP was an exceptional collaboration experience between Italy, Cuba, and the United States.