Dirty money? The politics of representation in Cuban revolutionary banknotes

This article examines the visual politics of Cuban postrevolutionary banknotes, focusing on the series minted in 1961. It is argued that the iconography of this series – which stresses the revolutionary merits of Fidel Castro and his movement, and associates the latter with the independence wars – portrays the Castro-led Cuban Revolution as the fulfilment of the nation’s aspiration to sovereignty. The article maintains that the design of the 1961 banknote series articulates tropes that convey a fidelista imaginary, presenting the visual rhetoric of currencies as a mechanism of propaganda and persuasion.