José Antonio Aponte was a free man of color, carpenter, artist, and alleged leader of a massive antislavery conspiracy and rebellion in colonial Cuba in 1811-1812. He was the creator of an unusual work of art - a “book of paintings” full of historical and mythical figures, including black kings, emperors, priests, and soldiers - that he showed to and discussed with fellow conspirators. The site provides an annotated version of the trial record of Aponte’s descriptions of the “book of paintings” and the the visual and textual references that connect Aponte’s vision of a black history situated in diasporic and transatlantic past with the possibility of imagining a sovereign future for free and enslaved people of color in colonial Cuba.