Guerrillero Heroico: Michael Korda's famous 1960 photograph of Ernesto "Che" Guevara

by Jack Brummet, Travel Editor

Guerrillero Heroico: this image of Ernesto "Che" Guevara, by Cuban photographer Michael Korda was taken in Havana in 1960 at a memorial service for the victims of the Le Coubre explosion. By the end of the 1960s, Guevara's notoriety and revolutionary actions and execution (by CIA-hired assassins), solidified the leader and his image as an icon.

Korda once said that at the moment he shot the picture at the funeral, he was drawn to Guevara's facial expression, which showed "absolute implacability" as well as anger and pain.

Images of Che Guevara are ubiquitous in Cuba (and over much of the world). There are also, of course, many images of Fidel Castro, who survived Che by over 50 years. But it is Che you see *everywhere*, in many forms and mediums.

The image was the focus of a documentary "Chevolution," by Trisha Ziff, as well as a 2009 book "Che's Afterlife: The Legacy of an Image" by Michael Casey."

It is a stunning photograph and fascinating to see (in such a heavily controlled and monitored society) the degree of exploitation of this image, in memorials, photos, books, and posters. Here are some of the trash and trinkets we saw.

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