Contents
Wifredo Lam
Painting The Jungle and bringing Afro-Cuban imagery into modern art.
The Jungle · The Eternal Present
- Born
- 8 December 1902
- Birthplace
- Sagua La Grande, Cuba
- Died
- 11 September 1982
More people
Wifredo Lam
Wifredo Lam was a Cuban artist whose work connected European modernism with Caribbean histories and spiritual traditions.
Early life
Cuban childhood
Grew up in a family with Chinese and African-Cuban roots.
Art education
Studied in Havana before moving to Spain in 1923.
Career
- 1920s–1930s
Spain
Developed as a painter and experienced the Spanish Civil War.
- 1938–1941
Paris and displacement
Met Pablo Picasso and Surrealist artists before returning to Cuba.
- 1940s onward
International career
Developed his distinctive figures and exhibited widely.
Selected work
The Jungle
Combined hybrid figures with dense sugar-cane imagery.
The Eternal Present
Explored interlocking bodies and symbolic forms.
Printmaking and ceramics
Extended his imagery into other media.
Beyond the studio
Cross-cultural practice
Resisted treating Afro-Cuban culture as decorative exoticism.
Later years
Worked between European and Caribbean settings.
Sources & photo credit
Life, career and references ↗Museum of Modern Art: The Jungle ↗Photo: Original uploader was Mfoto at en.wikipedia. CC BY 3.0 · Original image. Cropped and displayed in monochrome.
