 This sardonic Cuban humor has become as ubiquitous in Cuban art as the bright Caribbean colors of its palette.Eduardo Ponjuan, Glexis Novoa (of the ABTV group), Carlos Rodriguez Cardenas, Carlos Garaicoa, Rene Francisco and Enrique Silvestre are exemplars of this sensibility, mixing it with kitsch and harkening back in time while identifying with current Cuban attitudes, liberating art on the eve of the Cuban 'special period', in which the Soviet Union withdrew its financial aid.In 1990 the Cuban government began programs to stimulate the tourist trade as a means of offsetting the loss of Soviet support.