House of Elián Gonzalez

The surreal House of Elián Gonzalez, subject of one of the most bitter international custody battles of the 1990s, is a shrine, a time capsule and an exercise in the creation of public iconography. Since 2001 the house has become a temple to the symbology of the most anti-Castro Cuban exile politics. The little property is scattered with homages to Jesus, American flags and images of Elian himself, who is all but explicitly labeled a little saint of his people. Elián’s great-uncle Delfin bought the house in late 2000 and then froze time inside: Elian’s clothes hang in the closet, the inner tube that saved his life at sea hangs on the wall and his Spiderman pajamas are laid out on the bed. And then there’s the life-sized enlargement of the Pulitzer prize–winning photograph of Elián hiding in the closet and being seized by federal border-patrol agents at gunpoint. When we came, Delfin seemed surprised to see us, and we assume visitors have slacked off as memory of the Elián affair has faded. Today, Elian is a teenager in Cardenas, Cuba, where the Museo a la Batalla de Ideas (Museum of the Battle of Ideas) has its own, pro-Elian’s return exhibit on the affair, the Communist yin to Delfin’s anti-Castro yang.