Wifredo Óscar de la Concepción Lam y Castilla (December 8, 1902 – September 11, 1982), better known as Wilfredo Lam, was a Cuban artist who sought to portray and revive the enduring Afro-Cuban 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. Born December 8, 1902, was raised in Sagua La Grande, a village in the sugar farming province of Villa Clara, Cuba.

He was of mixed-race ancestry: his father, Yam Lam, was a Chinese immigrant and his mother, the former Ana Serafina Castilla, was born to a Congolese former slave mother and a Cuban mulatto 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 Santeria priestess locally celebrated as a healer and sorceress, he was exposed to rites of the African orishas. His contact with African celebrations and spiritual practices proved to be his largest artistic influence.

In 1916, his family moved to Havana, where he attended the Escuela de Bellas Artes. In 1923 he moved to Madrid, Spain where he studied at the studio of Fernando Alvarez de Sotomayor, the Director of the Museo del Prado. In 1929, Lam married Eva Piriz, who died of tuberculosis two years later, as did their young son. This tragic event may have contributed to the dark and brooding appearance of much of Lam’s later work.

In the early 1930s, the effects of Surrealism were evident in Lam’s work, as was the influence of Henri Matisse and Joaquín Torres-García. In 1936, a traveling exhibition of the work of Pablo Picasso shown in Barcelona, Bilbao, and Madrid provided inspiration to Lam both artistically and politically. Lam moved to Paris in 1938, where Picasso took him under his wing and encouraged his interest in African art and primitive masks. During that year, Lam also traveled to Mexico, where he stayed with Frida Kahlo and Diego Rivera.

Lam’s own multicultural heritage and his involvement with Santería, a religion rooted in African culture, would also become integral to his work. By the late 1930s, he was associated with the Surrealists. He had his first solo show at the Galerie Pierre Loeb in Paris in 1939, and his work was exhibited with Picasso’s at the Peris Galleries, New York that same year.

During World War II, Lam spent most of his time in the Caribbean, along with Claude Levi-Strauss, Andre Masson, and André Breton, whose poem, “Fata Morgana” he illustrated. He eventually made his way back to Cuba in 1941. It was there that he was introduced to the theories of Carl Jung, and by the end of 1942 he had begun his powerful painting, The Jungle.

Lam’s exploration of mythic images paralleled that of his contemporaries in New York, the Abstract Expressionists, though he used specific subject matter. created his own style by fusing Surrealism and Cubism with the spirit and forms of the Caribbean.

Between 1942 and 1950, he exhibited regularly at the Pierre Matisse Gallery in New York. His second marriage, to Helana Holzer in 1944 ended in divorce in 1950. He traveled extensively until 1952 and then settled for three years in Paris before resuming his travels again in 1955. It was that year that he married Swedish painter Lou Laurin, with whom he would have three sons.

In 1964, he received the Guggenheim International Award, and in 1966-67 there were multiple retrospectives of his work at the Kunsthalle Basel; the Kestner-Gesellschaft, Hannover, the Stedlijk Museum, Amsterdam; the Moderna Museet, Stockholm; and the Palais des Baux-Arts, Brussels. Wilfredo Lam died September 11, 1982, in Paris, France.

Source: HagertyMuseumArt/InternetPhotos/TheCubanHistory.com
Wilfredo Lam, a universal cuban.
The Cuban History, Arnoldo Varona, Editor

UN CUBANO UNIVERSAL, WILFREDO LAM

Wifredo Óscar de la Concepción Lam y Castilla (Diciembre 8, 1902 hasta septiembre 11, 1982), más conocido como Wilfredo Lam, fue un artista cubano que trató de presentar y revivir la permanente afro-cubana espíritu y la cultura. Inspirado por y en contacto con algunos de los artistas más renombrados del siglo 20, Lam combinó sus influencias y han creado un estilo único, que se caracteriza en última instancia por el protagonismo de figuras híbridas. A pesar de que era predominantemente un pintor, también trabajó con la escultura, la cerámica y el grabado en su vida posterior. Nacido 08 de diciembre 1902, se crió en Sagua La Grande, un pueblo de la provincia de cultivo de azúcar de Villa Clara, Cuba.