Wifredo Lam
Encyclopedia
Afro-Cuban
The term Afro-Cuban refers to Cubans of Sub Saharan African ancestry, and to historical or cultural elements in Cuba thought to emanate from this community...
spirit and culture. Inspired by and in contact with some of the most renowned artists of the 20th century, Lam melded his influences and created a unique style, which was ultimately characterized by the prominence of hybrid figures. Though he was predominantly a painter, he also worked with sculpture, ceramics and printmaking in his later life.
Early life
Wifredo Lam was born and raised in Sagua La GrandeSagua La Grande
Sagua La Grande is a municipality and city located on the north coast of the province of Villa Clara in central Cuba, on the Sagua la Grande River. The city is close to Mogotes de Jumagua, limestone cliffs...
, a village in the sugar farming province of Villa Clara
Villa Clara
Villa Clara may refer to:*Villa Clara Province, Cuba*Villa Clara, Entre Ríos, Argentina...
, Cuba
Cuba
The Republic of Cuba is an island nation in the Caribbean. The nation of Cuba consists of the main island of Cuba, the Isla de la Juventud, and several archipelagos. Havana is the largest city in Cuba and the country's capital. Santiago de Cuba is the second largest city...
. He was of mixed-race ancestry: his father, Yam Lam, was a Chinese
Chinese people
The term Chinese people may refer to any of the following:*People with Han Chinese ethnicity ....
immigrant and his mother, the former Ana Serafina Castilla, was born to a Congolese
Kongo people
The Bakongo or the Kongo people , also sometimes referred to as Kongolese or Congolese, is a Bantu ethnic group which lives along the Atlantic coast of Africa from Pointe-Noire to Luanda, Angola...
former slave mother and a Cuban mulatto
Mulatto
Mulatto denotes a person with one white parent and one black parent, or more broadly, a person of mixed black and white ancestry. Contemporary usage of the term varies greatly, and the broader sense of the term makes its application rather subjective, as not all people of mixed white and black...
father. In Sagua La Grande, Lam was surrounded by many people of African descent; his family, like many others, practiced Catholicism alongside their African traditions. Through his godmother, Matonica Wilson, a Santería
Santería
Santería is a syncretic religion of West African and Caribbean origin influenced by Roman Catholic Christianity, also known as Regla de Ocha, La Regla Lucumi, or Lukumi. Its liturgical language, a dialect of Yoruba, is also known as Lucumi....
priestess locally celebrated as a healer and sorceress
Witchcraft
Witchcraft, in historical, anthropological, religious, and mythological contexts, is the alleged use of supernatural or magical powers. A witch is a practitioner of witchcraft...
, he was exposed to rites of the African orisha
Orisha
An Orisha is a spirit or deity that reflects one of the manifestations of Olodumare in the Yoruba spiritual or religious system....
s. His contact with African celebrations and spiritual practices proved to be his largest artistic influence.
In 1916, Lam moved to Havana
Havana
Havana is the capital city, province, major port, and leading commercial centre of Cuba. The city proper has a population of 2.1 million inhabitants, and it spans a total of — making it the largest city in the Caribbean region, and the most populous...
to study law, a path that his family had thrust upon him. Simultaneously, he also began studying tropical plants at the Botanical Gardens. From 1918 to 1923, Lam studied painting at the Escuela de Bellas Artes. However, Lam disliked both academic teaching and painting. He left for Madrid
Madrid
Madrid is the capital and largest city of Spain. The population of the city is roughly 3.3 million and the entire population of the Madrid metropolitan area is calculated to be 6.271 million. It is the third largest city in the European Union, after London and Berlin, and its metropolitan...
in the autumn of 1923 to further his art studies.
Career in Europe
In 1923, Lam began studying in Madrid under Fernando Álvarez de Sotomayor y ZaragozaFernando Álvarez de Sotomayor y Zaragoza
Fernando Álvarez de Sotomayor y Zaragoza was a Spanish painter.- Biography :...
, the curator of the Museo del Prado
Museo del Prado
The Museo del Prado is the main Spanish national art museum, located in central Madrid. It features one of the world's finest collections of European art, from the 12th century to the early 19th century, based on the former Spanish Royal Collection, and unquestionably the best single collection of...
and teacher of Salvador Dalí
Salvador Dalí
Salvador Domènec Felip Jacint Dalí i Domènech, Marquis de Púbol , commonly known as Salvador Dalí , was a prominent Spanish Catalan surrealist painter born in Figueres,Spain....
. In the mornings he would attend the studio of the reactionary painter, while he spent his evenings working alongside young, nonconformist painters. At the Prado, Lam discovered and was awed by the work of Hieronymus Bosch and Pieter Bruegel I. While his early paintings were in the modernist Spanish tradition, his work soon became more simplified and decorative. Though Lam's dislike for academic conservatism persisted, his time in Spain marked his technical development in which he began to merge a primitive aesthetic and the traditions of Western composition. In 1929, he married Eva Piriz but both she and their young son died in 1931 of tuberculosis
Tuberculosis
Tuberculosis, MTB, or TB is a common, and in many cases lethal, infectious disease caused by various strains of mycobacteria, usually Mycobacterium tuberculosis. Tuberculosis usually attacks the lungs but can also affect other parts of the body...
; it is likely that this personal tragedy contributed to the dark nature of his work.
During the 1930s Lam was exposed to a variety of influences. In his work, the influence of Surrealism
Surrealism
Surrealism is a cultural movement that began in the early 1920s, and is best known for the visual artworks and writings of the group members....
was discernable, as well as that of Henri Matisse
Henri Matisse
Henri Matisse was a French artist, known for his use of colour and his fluid and original draughtsmanship. He was a draughtsman, printmaker, and sculptor, but is known primarily as a painter...
. Throughout Lam's travels through the Spanish countryside, he developed empathy for the Spanish peasants, whose strife, in some ways, mirrored that of the former slaves he grew up around in Cuba. Therefore, at the outbreak of the Spanish Civil War
Spanish Civil War
The Spanish Civil WarAlso known as The Crusade among Nationalists, the Fourth Carlist War among Carlists, and The Rebellion or Uprising among Republicans. was a major conflict fought in Spain from 17 July 1936 to 1 April 1939...
, Lam sided with the Republicans where he used his talent to fashion Republican posters and propaganda. Drafted to defend Madrid, Lam was incapacitated during the fighting in late 1937 and was sent to Barcelona
Barcelona
Barcelona is the second largest city in Spain after Madrid, and the capital of Catalonia, with a population of 1,621,537 within its administrative limits on a land area of...
. There, he met Helena Holzer, a German researcher, and the Catalan artist known as Manolo Huguë. Manolo gave Lam the letter of introduction that sparked his friendship with Picasso, whose artwork had impressed and inspired Lam a year before when he saw an exhibition in Madrid.
In 1938, Lam moved to Paris. Picasso quickly became a big supporter of Lam, introducing him to many of the leading artists of the time, such as Fernand Léger
Fernand Léger
Joseph Fernand Henri Léger was a French painter, sculptor, and filmmaker. In his early works he created a personal form of Cubism which he gradually modified into a more figurative, populist style...
, Henri Matisse
Henri Matisse
Henri Matisse was a French artist, known for his use of colour and his fluid and original draughtsmanship. He was a draughtsman, printmaker, and sculptor, but is known primarily as a painter...
, Georges Braque
Georges Braque
Georges Braque[p] was a major 20th century French painter and sculptor who, along with Pablo Picasso, developed the art style known as Cubism.-Early Life:...
and Joan Miró
Joan Miró
Joan Miró i Ferrà was a Spanish Catalan painter, sculptor, and ceramicist born in Barcelona.Earning international acclaim, his work has been interpreted as Surrealism, a sandbox for the subconscious mind, a re-creation of the childlike, and a manifestation of Catalan pride...
. Picasso also introduced him to Pierre Loeb, a Parisian art dealer; Loeb gave Lam his first exhibition at the Galerie Pierre Loeb in 1939, which received an enthusiastic response from critics. Picasso and Lam also exhibited their work together at the Perls Galleries in New York
New York
New York is a state in the Northeastern region of the United States. It is the nation's third most populous state. New York is bordered by New Jersey and Pennsylvania to the south, and by Connecticut, Massachusetts and Vermont to the east...
in the same year. Lam's work went from showing the influence of Matisse seen in his still life
Still life
A still life is a work of art depicting mostly inanimate subject matter, typically commonplace objects which may be either natural or man-made...
s, landscapes and simplified portraits to being influenced by Cubism
Cubism
Cubism was a 20th century avant-garde art movement, pioneered by Pablo Picasso and Georges Braque, that revolutionized European painting and sculpture, and inspired related movements in music, literature and architecture...
. Mainly working with gouache
Gouache
Gouache[p], also spelled guache, the name of which derives from the Italian guazzo, water paint, splash or bodycolor is a type of paint consisting of pigment suspended in water. A binding agent, usually gum arabic, is also present, just as in watercolor...
, Lam began producing stylized figures that appear to be influenced by Picasso. Much of his work in 1938 possessed emotional intensity; the subject matter ranged from interacting couples to women in despair and showed a considerably stronger African influence, seen in the figures’ angular outlines and the synthesis of their bodies.
While Lam began simplifying his forms before he came into contact with Picasso's work, it is apparent that Picasso had a significant impact on him. With regard to Picasso's exhibition, Lam said that it was "not only a revelation, but… a shock." Lam gained the approval of Picasso, whose encouragement has been said to have led Lam to search for his own interpretation of modernism.
With the outbreak of World War II and the Germans invading Paris, Lam left for Marseille
Marseille
Marseille , known in antiquity as Massalia , is the second largest city in France, after Paris, with a population of 852,395 within its administrative limits on a land area of . The urban area of Marseille extends beyond the city limits with a population of over 1,420,000 on an area of...
in 1940. There, he rejoined many intellectuals, including the Surrealists, with whom he had been associated since he met André Breton
André Breton
André Breton was a French writer and poet. He is known best as the founder of Surrealism. His writings include the first Surrealist Manifesto of 1924, in which he defined surrealism as "pure psychic automatism"....
in 1939. In Marseille, Lam and Breton collaborated on the publication of Breton's poem Fata Morgana, which was illustrated by Lam. Though the drawings he created in Marseille between 1940 and 1941 are known as the Fata Morgana suite, only about three inspired the illustrations for the poem. In 1941, Breton, Lam and Claude Lévi-Strauss
Claude Lévi-Strauss
Claude Lévi-Strauss was a French anthropologist and ethnologist, and has been called, along with James George Frazer, the "father of modern anthropology"....
, accompanied by many others, left for Martinique
Martinique
Martinique is an island in the eastern Caribbean Sea, with a land area of . Like Guadeloupe, it is an overseas region of France, consisting of a single overseas department. To the northwest lies Dominica, to the south St Lucia, and to the southeast Barbados...
only to be imprisoned. After forty days, Lam was released and allowed to leave for Cuba, which he reached in midsummer 1941.
Havana years
Upon Lam's return to HavanaHavana
Havana is the capital city, province, major port, and leading commercial centre of Cuba. The city proper has a population of 2.1 million inhabitants, and it spans a total of — making it the largest city in the Caribbean region, and the most populous...
, he developed a new awareness of Afro-Cuban traditions. He noticed that the descendents of the slaves were still being oppressed and that the Afro-Cuban culture was degraded and made picturesque for the sake of tourism. He believed that Cuba was in danger of losing its African heritage and therefore sought to free them from cultural subjugation. In an interview with Max-Pol Fouchet, he said,
"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 horseTrojan HorseThe Trojan Horse is a tale from the Trojan War about the stratagem that allowed the Greeks finally to enter the city of Troy and end the conflict. In the canonical version, after a fruitless 10-year siege, the Greeks constructed a huge wooden horse, and hid a select force of men inside...
that would spew forth hallucinating figures with the power to surprise, to disturb the dreams of the exploiters."
Additionally, his time in Cuba marked a rapid evolution of his style. Drawing from his study of tropical plants and familiarity with Afro-Cuban culture, his paintings became characterized by the presence of a hybrid figure—part human, animal and vegetal elements. His style was also distinctive because of its fusion of Surrealist and Cubist approaches with imagery and symbols from Santería. In 1943, he began his best-known work, The Jungle. It reflected his mature style, depicting four figures with mask-like heads, half-emerging from dense tropical vegetation. Later that year, it was shown in an exhibition at the Pierre Matisse
Pierre Matisse
Pierre Matisse was an art dealer active in New York City. He was the youngest child of French painter Henri Matisse.-Background and early years:...
Gallery in New York where it created controversy. The painting depicted the tension between Modernism
Modernism
Modernism, in its broadest definition, is modern thought, character, or practice. More specifically, the term describes the modernist movement, its set of cultural tendencies and array of associated cultural movements, originally arising from wide-scale and far-reaching changes to Western society...
and the vibrancy and energy of African culture. The Jungle was ultimately purchased by the Museum of Modern Art N.Y.
Museum of Modern Art
The Museum of Modern Art is an art museum in Midtown Manhattan in New York City, on 53rd Street, between Fifth and Sixth Avenues. It has been important in developing and collecting modernist art, and is often identified as the most influential museum of modern art in the world...
and was hung near Picasso's Guernica
Guernica (painting)
Guernica is a painting by Pablo Picasso. It was created in response to the bombing of Guernica, Basque Country, by German and Italian warplanes at the behest of the Spanish Nationalist forces, on 26 April 1937, during the Spanish Civil War...
, to which it has been compared.
Lam continued to simplify and synthesize abstraction yet continued painting figurally; he also kept on developing the mythology
Mythology
The term mythology can refer either to the study of myths, or to a body or collection of myths. As examples, comparative mythology is the study of connections between myths from different cultures, whereas Greek mythology is the body of myths from ancient Greece...
and totemism
Totemism
Totemism is a system of belief in which humans are said to have kinship or a mystical relationship with a spirit-being, such as an animal or plant...
that defined his style. In 1944, he married Helana Holzer, whom he divorced in 1950. In 1946, he and Breton spent four months in Haiti
Haiti
Haiti , officially the Republic of Haiti , is a Caribbean country. It occupies the western, smaller portion of the island of Hispaniola, in the Greater Antillean archipelago, which it shares with the Dominican Republic. Ayiti was the indigenous Taíno or Amerindian name for the island...
, enriching his already extensive understanding and knowledge of African divinity and magic rituals through observing Voodoun ceremonies. Although he later said that his contact with the African spirituality that he found throughout the Americas did not directly impact his formal style. African poetry, on the other hand, was said to have had a broadening effect on his paintings. In 1950 Wifredo Lam worked together with René Portocarrero
René Portocarrero
René Portocarrero was a Cuban artist recognised internationally for his achievements.-History:...
and others in the village Santiago de Las Vegas, the group of painters worked on ceramic. In 1952, Lam settled in Paris after having divided his time between Cuba, New York and France.
Lam, who continued to sympathize with the common man, exhibited a series of paintings at Havana University in 1955, to demonstrate his support for the students’ protests against Batista's dictatorship. Similarly, in 1965, 6 years after the revolution, Lam showed his loyalty to Castro and his goals of social and economic equality by painting El Tercer Mundo (The Third World) for the presidential palace. In 1960, Lam established a studio in Albissola Marina
Albissola Marina
Albissola Marina is a comune in the Province of Savona in the Italian region Liguria, located about 35 km west of Genoa and about 4 km northeast of Savona.-History:...
on Italy's northwest coast and settled there with his wife Lou Laurin, a Swedish painter, and their three sons. In 1964, he was awarded the Guggenheim International Award and between 1966 and 1967 there were many retrospectives of his work throughout Europe. At the encouragement of Asger Jorn
Asger Jorn
Asger Oluf Jorn was a Danish painter, sculptor, ceramic artist, and author. He was a founding member of the avant-garde movement COBRA and the Situationist International...
and after being intrigued by the local pottery making, Lam began to experiment with ceramics and had his first ceramic exhibition in 1975. He progressed to model sculptures and cast in metal in his twilight years, often depicting personages similar to those he had painted.
Wifredo Lam died on September 11, 1982 in Paris. Having had over one hundred personal exhibitions around the world, Lam had a well established reputation by the time of his death.
Legacy
Lam, like many of the most renowned artists of the 20th century, combined radical modern styles with the "primitive" arts of the Americas. While Diego RiveraDiego Rivera
Diego María de la Concepción Juan Nepomuceno Estanislao de la Rivera y Barrientos Acosta y Rodríguez was a prominent Mexican painter born in Guanajuato, Guanajuato, an active communist, and husband of Frida Kahlo . His large wall works in fresco helped establish the Mexican Mural Movement in...
and Joaquín Torres García
Joaquín Torres García
Joaquín Torres García , was a Uruguayan plastic artist and art theorist, also known as the founder of Constructive Universalism...
drew inspiration from Pre-Columbian art
Pre-Columbian art
Pre-Columbian art is the visual arts of indigenous peoples of the Caribbean, North, Central, and South Americas until the late 15th and early 16th centuries, and the time period marked by Christopher Columbus' arrival in the Americas....
, Wifredo Lam was influenced by the Afro-Cubans of the time. Lam dramatically synthesized the Surrealist and Cubist strategies while incorporating the iconography and spirit of Afro-Cuban religion. For that reason, his work does not singularly belong to an art movement.
He held the belief that society focused too much on the individual and sought to show humanity as a whole in his artwork. He painted generic figures, creating the universal. To further his goal, he often painted mask
African tribal masks
Ritual and ceremonial masks are an essential feature of the traditional culture and art of the peoples of Subsaharan and West Africa. While the specific implications associated to ritual masks widely vary in different cultures, some traits are common to most African cultures: for example, masks...
-like faces. While Cuban culture and mythology permeated his work, it dealt with the nature of man and therefore was wholly relatable to non-Cubans.
The Jungle
The Jungle was not, however, intended to describe the primitivism of Cuba. Rather, Lam's intention was to depict a spiritual state—that which is surely inspired by Santería; he sheds light on the absurdity that has become Afro-Cuban culture and more specifically on the way their traditions were cheapened for tourism. He sought to describe the reality of his people through the powerful work and gained acclaim and fame for doing so.
Art works
- . 1938. Collection Conseil général de Martinique, France.
- Mother and Child. 1939. Art Institute of Chicago, Chicago.
- Anamu. 1942. Museum of Contemporary Art, Chicago.
- Satan. 1942. Museum of Modern Art, New York.
- The Jungle. 1943. The Museum of Modern Art, New York.
- Untitled. 1943. Museum of Fine Arts, Boston
- Homenaje a jicotea. ca. 1943. Lowe Art Museum, University of Miami.
- Untitled. 1945. Galerie Lelong, Paris.
- . 1947. Galerie Lelong, Paris.
- . 1947. Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, Smithsonian Institution.
- Exodo. 1948. Howard University Gallery of Art, Washington, D.C.
- . 1948. Indianapolis Museum of Art.
- Lisamona. 1950. Collection Steven M. Greenbaum, New Hampshire.
- . 1964. Museum of Modern Art, Brussels.
- El Tercer Mundo. 1965–1966. Museo Nacional de Bellas Artes, Havana.
- The Shadow of Days. 1970.
Exhibitions
- "Wifredo Lam Peintures." Galerie Pierre, Paris. June 30 – July 14, 1939.
- "Drawings by Picasso and Gouaches by Wifredo Lam." Perls Gallery, New York. November 13- December 2, 1939.
- "Lam Paintings." Pierre Matisse Gallery, New York. November 17- December 5, 1942.
- "Lam Paintings." Pierre Matisse Gallery, New York. June 6–24, 1944.
- "Lam Paintings." Pierre Matisse Gallery, New York. November 20- December 8, 1945.
- "Wifredo Lam." Galerie Pierre, Paris. December 12–31, 1945.
- "Lam" Centre d'Art Galerie, Port-au-Prince, Haïti, January 24 to February 3, 1946.
- "The Cuban Painter Wifredo Lam." The London Gallery, London. November 5–30, 1946.
- "Lam: Obras Recientes 1950." Parque Central, Havana. October 2–15, 1950.
- "Wifredo Lam." Museo de Bellas Artes, Caracas, May 8–22, 1955.
- "Wifredo Lam." University of Notre Dame, Notre Dame, January 8–22, 1961.
- " Wifredo Lam Malerei, Vic Gentils Bildhauerei." Kunsthalle, Basel, September 10 – October 9, 1966; "Wifredo Lam." Kestner-Gesellshaft, Hanover, December 16, 1966 – January 16, 1967; Stedelijk Museum, January 26 – March 12, 1967; Moderna Museet, Stockholm, April 8 – May 7, 1967; Palais des Beaux-Arts, Brussels, May 18 – June 18, 1967.
- "Wifredo Lam." Ordrupgaard, Charlottenlund (Denmark), September 14 -October 15, 1978; Sonja Henie, Niels Onstad Foundation, Høvikkoden (Norway),
- "Homenaje a Wifredo Lam 1902–1982." Museo Nacional de Arte Contemporaneo, Madrid, October 20- December 12, 1982; Musée d'Ixelles, Brussels, January 7 -March 6, 1983; Musée d'Art Moderne de la Ville de Paris, Paris, March 23 – May 22, 1983.
- "Wifredo Lam, Prints." Central Institute of Fine Arts, Beijing; Palace of Fine Arts, Shanghaï; Institute of Fine Arts, Hangzhou, Institute of Fine Arts; Guangzhou; Art Center, Hong Kong, September 1991 – March, 1992.
- "Wifredo Lam: A Retrospective of Works on Paper." Americas Society, New York, September 19 – December 20, 1992; Fundacio La Caixa, Barcelona, January 21 – March 21, 1993.
- "Wifredo Lam." Museo Nacional Centreo de Arte Reina Sofia, Madrid, September 29 – December 14, 1992; Fundacio Miro, Barcelona, January, 21 – March 21, 1993.
- "Lam métis." Fondation Dapper, Paris, September 26, 2001 to January 20, 2002.
- "Wifredo Lam: The Changing Image, Centennial Exhibition." Yokohama Museum of Art, Yokohama, October 2002 – January 2003.
- "Wifredo Lam et les poètes." Musée Campredon, Maison René Char, L'Isle sur la Sorgue, France, July 7 -October 2, 2005.
- "Wifredo Lam in North America", Haggerty Museum of Art, Marquette University, Milwaukee October 11, 2007 – January 21, 2008. Miami Art Museum, Miami, February 8 – May 18, 2008; Museum of Latin American Art, Long Beach, June 12 -August 31, 2008; Dali Museum, St Petersburg (FL), October 2, 2008 – January 10, 2009.
- "Wifredo Lam, gravuras", Caixa Cultural de Rio de Janeiro, Rio de Janeiro, October 22 – January 3, 2010; Pinacoteca de Estado, São Paulo, February 27 – May 2, 2010.
- "Wifredo Lam 1902–1982: Voyages entre caraïbes et avant-gardes" Musée des Beaux-Arts de Nantes, France, May 6 – August 29, 2010.
- "Césaire, Lam, Picasso, Nous nous sommes trouvés", Galerie nationales du Grand Palais, Paris, France, March 16 – June 6, 2011.
External links
- Wifredo Lam Official Website (in French)
- Ediciones Vanguardia Cubana. Libros de Pintura Cubana, Wifredo Lam
- http://www.guggenheimcollection.org/site/artist_bio_83.html – Lam's biography at the GuggenheimSolomon R. Guggenheim MuseumThe Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum is a well-known museum located on the Upper East Side of Manhattan in New York City, United States. It is the permanent home to a renowned collection of Impressionist, Post-Impressionist, early Modern, and contemporary art and also features special exhibitions...
website - http://www.moma.org/collection/browse_results.php?criteria=O:AD:E:3349&page_number=1&template_id=6&sort_order=1- Museum of Modern Art's Collection
- http://www.matta-art.com/lam/lam.htm – Online Gallery of Lam's art
See also
- Cuban artCuban ArtCuban art is a very diverse cultural blend of African, European and North American design reflecting the diverse demographic of the island. Cuban artists embraced European modernism and the early part of the 20th century saw a growth in Cuban vanguardism movements, these movements were...