Wilfredo Lam in North America
June 15 – Aug. 31, 2008
The Afro-Chinese Cuban artist Wifredo Lam (Cuba, b. 1902, Cuba; Paris, d.1982) is the most celebrated artist of the Caribbean region and the first Cuban artist to be recognized as a master among the mid-20th century modern artists.
June 15 – Aug. 31, 2008
The Afro-Chinese Cuban artist Wifredo Lam (Cuba, b. 1902, Cuba; Paris, d.1982) is the most celebrated artist of the Caribbean region and the first Cuban artist to be recognized as a master among the mid-20th century modern artists. Associated with Pablo Picasso during the time of Cubism and Andre Breton in the time of surrealism, Lam contributed a non-European Afro-Cuban voice to the evolution of Western art.
His visual language is a synthesis of Cubism, Surrealism, “primitivism”, Negritude, Afro-Cuban history and ethnicity and the religious practice of Santería. Lam was born of a polyglot heritage; his mother was African, indigenous Cuban and Spanish and his father was a Cantonese Chinese businessman. Lam said about himself, “…from childhood I didn’t know the basis of my ethics or my joy… except that I was a cross-breed of many races.” This cross-hybridization is the basis of Lam’s artistic style, more celebrated today than during his lifetime.
The exhibition Wifredo Lam in North America presents 65 of the most important paintings, gouaches and drawings by Lam represented in United States collections. The selected works were curated by Mr. Curtis Carter, former Director of the organizing institution, the Haggerty Museum of Art in Milwaukee, Wisconsin. A national traveling exhibition, molaa is the West Coast venue for this comprehensive presentation, the first in over 30 years to be seen in the United States. Mr. Carter, the curator, will be in attendance at the Member’s Opening Reception. The exhibition is accompanied by an illustrated catalog available in the museum store.
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