Wifredo Lam

WIFREDO LAM (Sagua La Grande, Cuba, 1902 - Paris, 1982).
"Avila", 1932.
Oil on canvas.
Work reproduced in LAURIN-LAM, Lou: Catalogue Raisonné of the Painted Work Volume I 1923-1960. Acatos, 1996. P. 234. Cat. 32.04. B/W rep.
Signed, dedicated "to my good friend Dr. Cordero" and dated in the upper right area.
Measurements: 70 x 90 cm; 100 x 118 cm (frame).

Ávila belongs to a fundamental stage in the career of Wifredo Lam, one of the most influential artists of the international avant-garde of the 20th century. Far from being a simple forerunner of his later production, the work already reveals a remarkable ability to transform visible reality into an image charged with emotional tension, symbolism and psychological depth, qualities that would end up defining his most personal language.

Produced during the artist's years in Spain, the painting reflects the profound impact that both the Spanish pictorial tradition -especially Velázquez and Goya- and certain modern currents linked to symbolism and expressionism had on Lam. Far from any descriptive vision, the artist transforms the Castilian city into a monumental and silent presence, dominated by the stony mass of its walls and by an atmosphere of intense emotional charge. The composition stands out for the architectural solidity of the forms and for a restrained palette of gray, greenish and bluish tones that envelops the landscape in a sense of recollection and mystery. Rather than representing a specific place, Lam turns the city into an image of spiritual and psychological resonance, revealing an inclination towards the symbolic transformation of reality that will be a constant throughout his production.

Seen from the perspective of his later career, Avila is of exceptional interest. Although still distant from the famous hybrid figures and Afro-Cuban imagery that would define fundamental works such as La Jungla, the painting anticipates one of the keys to his language: the ability to transcend visible appearance to construct universes charged with meaning. As a testimony of a crucial formative stage, the work allows us to understand the process by which Lam evolved from the European tradition towards a radically personal proposal that would expand the limits of surrealism and occupy a central place in the history of the international avant-garde.