Gato Tuerto Restaurant & Bar
O STREET. MIRAMAR
The One-eyed Cat Club was inaugurated on August 31st, 1960, from a Felito Ayon’s project, a character with a lot of charisma, entertainer and one of the founders of La Bodeguita del Medio Bar in the early 1950s. The restaurant is located on the upper floors to separate it from intimate and bolero “discharges”, and its walls were set with works by Cuban painters such as Amelia Peláez, Raúl Acosta León, Mariano Rodríguez, Luis Mariano Pedro, Alberto Falcón, Tomás Marai and Raúl Tapia, while the construction design was in charge of Evelio Piña and Frank Olorticochea. Almost all famous feeling voices have sung at El Gato Tuerto: Elena Burke , Omara Portuondo , Moraima Secada , Lino Borges , César Portillo de la Luz, José Antonio Méndez, Frank Emilio, Las Capellas, Bobby Jiménez, Vilma Valle, Raúl Acosta, Doris de la Torre, Frank Domínguez, and others. In the 1970s El Gato Tuerto was closed, reopening again in 1980 until 1985. Three years later it was remodeled again, to host the Guinness Record for the longest Bolero in the world, with uninterrupted 76-hour duration, in which 498 singers participated, who performed 2,175 songs, in those memorable days that lasted from 21 to 25 June of the 2001. Among the most illustrious visitors to El Gato Tuerto are Gabriel García Márquez, Cheo Feliciano, Miguel Barnet, Pablo Armando Fernández and Virgilio Piñera, who was the author of a poem dedicated to the emblematic site. There is a very cultural element that adorns the site; Amelia Peláez’s artwork “The Dishes”. The cocktails and the cuisine at this club are linked to the arts and the Cuban culture, with the creation of typical and original cocktails, as well as menus designed by great Cuban artists.
A permanent memorial site for the great Argentine motorist Juan Manuel Fangio, five times Formula One world champion is located in this emblematic cultural center. There is a wall especially dedicated to show photos, some of them unpublished, from the first and second Grand Prix of Cuba, which Fangio won in 1957. A replica of the suit worn by the famous motorist in his race in Havana is also showed. It was donated by the Fangio Foundation.
Since 2007, the project “Somos lo que hay” (We are what there is) , directed by Emilio Nuñez, has established its headquarters at the Gato Tuerto, exhibiting artworks from well-known artists such as Nelson Domínguez and Ever Fonseca, as well as Zaida del Rio and Javier Guerra among others.
INFORMATION
EMAIL: info@dancingcuba.com
