MoMA shows the largest retrospective of Wifredo Lam in the US

There is a “paradox” around the figure of the Cuban surrealist painter Wifredo Lam (1902-1982): although his name is “well known,” at the same time “he is not known,” says his son Eskil Lam on the occasion of the exhibition. When I don’t sleep, I dream (When I don’t sleep, I dream), organized by the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) in New York.

Billed as the “largest retrospective dedicated to the artist in the United States” and “the first to show his entire career,” it includes more than 130 works including paintings, collaborative drawings, illustrated books, prints, ceramics and archival material, from the 1920s to the 1970s. the jungle (1943), an emblematic painting by Lam, is part of the museum’s collection.

“It is difficult to describe my father to someone who does not know him,” points out the person responsible for his father’s legacy in a MoMA documentary. “Art history needs drawers to classify people, such as Latin American or Cuban artists. For me that was one of the reasons why he is not classified as much as his work itself.”

The retrospective revolves around the idea of ​​how Lam, an artist born in Cuba, who spent most of his life in Spain, France and Italy, “came to embody the figure of the transnational artist in the 20th century.” Of Chinese and African descent, at one point he declared that his art was an “act of decolonization,” to the extent that his affinity for poetry and collaborations allowed him to disrupt and overcome the colonial structures he faced in art and life. Aware that “he ran the risk of not being understood,” for Lam “a true painting has the power to set the imagination going, even if it takes time.”

The Wifredo Lam Contemporary Art Center, in Havana, was taken into account in the preparations for the exhibition. “One of our specialists, José Manuel Noceda, an expert in Lam, participated in the first days of preparing the exhibition,” says Lisset Alonso Compte, deputy artistic director of the Center.

Born in Sagua La Grande, at age 21 Lam obtained a scholarship to continue his studies in Spain to train as a portrait painter. Immersed in an environment of intellectuals from Europe and Latin America, Lam began to become interested in modernism. “Those were difficult times,” says Eskil Lam. The outbreak of the Spanish civil war stirred his political conscience. “My father had strong feelings about fighting against an oppressive regime: fascism. It was the first time he had experienced war and he joined the battle. That’s where he met a friend of Pablo Picasso, who encouraged him to go to Paris, for which he gave him a letter of introduction.”

The cubist artist took him under his wing and helped him find his first gallery. “Picasso introduced me to André Breton. Then, I found that he had touched something very important and I joined the surrealist movement,” Lam notes in the MoMA documentary. The outbreak of World War II sparked a new diaspora. Just before the arrival of German troops in Paris, Lam asked a photographer to go to his studio and photograph his entire production, then he rolled it up and took it to Picasso to keep until after the war, “which he did.”

Lam managed to reach Marseille. There he found a multitude of people who were trying to save themselves, but at the same time they were drawing as a way to overcome their problems through creation. That spirit and practice remained with Lam throughout his career. This, in addition, was a relevant moment stylistically, to the extent that his drawings changed radically to produce a hybridization of half-animal and half-human figures.

back to the island

In this new diaspora the artist was not lucky enough to be admitted to the United States or Mexico. His native country, on the other hand, welcomed him after an absence of almost 20 years. Installed in Havana, Lam reflected on his own tradition and culture, and how he could mix them with the idea of ​​modernism. His immediate project was to paint the jungle.

“This painting was inspired by nature; however, the shadows are almost half animal and half plant. On the left side is a terrible woman with scissors. I used it to suggest that nature will produce a mutation of pragmatic and mechanical deterioration that did not agree with my country at that time,” Lam said.

The quality of the light and the intensity of the colors of Cuba impressed him. the jungle It seems to light up from within. Although it looks like a canvas, it is made on kraft paper. Lam’s financial situation was not good, nor was his access to materials. To work, Lam had to thin the oil paint, although the paper was so wet that it dripped onto the surface, something that can be seen in different areas of the painting.

Lam painted “intensely and concentratedly” through “explosions of activity.” During the day he received visitors and at night he dedicated himself to uninterrupted study.

In Cuba, Lam reinvented his practice and created a new imaginary of visual symbols that constitutes a step forward with respect to his influences and interests in Afro-Caribbean spiritual practices. A recurring image is that of a bird, initially a bat; However, it became “a symbol of my things. The bird that has encouraged me, that is myself, that runs after something that I am trying to find.”

Wifredo Lam:When I don’t sleep, I dream It is on view until April 11, 2026, at the Museum of Modern Art in New York.