When Fidel Castro and Che Guevara discussed thier desire to educate the people in a show of power for the revolution—the Escuelas Nacionales de Arte (National Art Schools) was born. Housing an art school that reflected the new socialist Cuba of the 1960s, the school was built with local materials and Catalan vaults throughout, repudiating Western-style International Modernism. Unfortunately, such “exoticism” fell out of favor and the buildings fell into neglect. Though the buildings have been put on the World Monument Fund watch list since 2000, their future remains uncertain, complicated by the challenges of tourism and investment pressures that jeopardize the character of Cuba.