Vol. 72/No. 16      April 21, 2008

The exhibit runs here through May 18. It then shows at the Museum of Latin American Art in Long Beach, California, from June 12-August 31. The final showing will be at the Dali Museum, St. Petersburg, Florida, from October 2-January 10.

Twenty years ago a painting by an artist from Cuba was burned in the streets here by counterrevolutionary Cubans determined to prevent discussion of and support to the revolution. These rightist elements hold far less sway today, including among more recently arriving immigrants from Cuba.

More than 800 people turned out here for the February opening of the “Wifredo Lam in North America” exhibit, and the collection has continued to attract crowds without incident.

Born in 1902, Lam was the son of a Chinese immigrant. His mother was Afro-Cuban. Lam became one of Cuba’s most renowned artists. A participant in the 1930s Surrealist movement, Lam reflected the powerful social and political conquests of the anticolonial revolution.

Featured in the exhibit are 64 paintings, drawings, and other works created by Lam between 1927 and 1975, along with a collection of documents and photographs chronicling the artist’s life and artistic development over five decades.

Lam left Cuba in his 20s for Spain. When the Spanish Civil War broke out in the 1930s, he fought on the Republican side.

Shortly before the defeat of the Republic by the Fascists, Lam went to Paris. There he became a longtime friend and collaborator of André Breton, leader of the Surrealist movement and an outspoken opponent of Stalinism’s impact on artists and intellectuals. Lam was also befriended and influenced by Spanish painter Pablo Picasso, who encouraged his interest in African art.

With the conquest of France by the Nazis, Lam went to the Caribbean, where he collaborated with Aimé Césaire in Martinique and contributed to his magazine, Tropique. Together with Breton, Lam visited Haiti where the artists observed Vodou ceremonies.

Of particular interest in this exhibit are several works from Lam’s 1940s “Cuban Period,” when he began drawing more directly on Afro-Cuban culture with its roots in Africa, slavery, and Santería ceremonies.

“I decided that my painting would never be the equivalent of that pseudo-Cuban music for nightclubs,” Lam said. “I refused to paint cha-cha-cha. I wanted with all my heart to paint the drama of my country, but by thoroughly expressing the negro spirit, the beauty of the plastic art of the blacks. In this way I could act as a Trojan horse that would spew forth hallucinating figures with the power to surprise, to disturb the dreams of the exploiters.”

Lam first returned to Cuba in 1941. Between 1941 and 1952 he lived and worked in Havana, New York, and Paris. He settled in Paris, but continued to visit Cuba often, contributing his artistic talents to public murals. In 1981, he was awarded the Orden Felix Varela de Primer Grado for his contribution to culture.

Lam died in Paris 1982. At his wish, his remains were returned to Cuba, where he received a state funeral and was buried in the Armed Forces section of the Colón cemetery in Havana, honoring his participation along with other Cubans in the Spanish Civil War. Cuba celebrated a “Lam Centennial” in 2002.
 
 
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