A GLANCE AT AMELIA in the NMFA

Havana: The 115th anniversary of Amelia Pelaez’s birthday is observed at the National Museum of Fine Arts since the grand opening last friday of a flashback look at her work.

Amelia Pelaez: A Flashback Look (1926-1967), curated by Roberto Cobas, is made up of forty of her paintings and drawings –some of them very much unknown- which are treasured in the storehouses of the National Museum of Fine Arts.

The public could feast eyes on her still-life works in colonial interiors –a theme she’s known for- some artworks that came after her stay in Paris in the 1920s, plus other pieces dating back from the 1940s, 50s and 60s.

This retrospective glance, that will remain open through April 17 at the nonpermanent halls (second and third floors) of the Cuban Art Building, is considered quite a development in the ongoing panorama of the Cuban plastic arts because no similar exhibit had been organized since her centennial birthday.

Amelia Pelaez (Yaguajay, Sancti Spíritus, 1896-1968), was a forerunner of the first avant-gardism in the Cuban arts in the early 20th century and grew to become one of the key figures in the history of the Cuban arts.

In 1916, she began her painting studies at the San Alejandro Academy. Her first exhibit was mounted in Havana back in 1924. In that same year she was admitted at The Art Students’ League of New York. In 1927, she traveled to Europe and toured several countries before eventually settling down in Paris. She took a number of free courses at the Grande Chaumiere, the National Higher School of Fine Arts and the Louvre School. She also took courses with Russian painter Alexandra Exter and returned to Cuba in 1934.

In 1937, she became a professor of Free Study Experimental Trial for Painters and Sculptors. She taught drawing in 1945 in public schools in the Havana neighborhood of Cerro. She won a number of prizes in national exhibits and illustrated books. In 1950, she started trying her hand at ceramics at the Santiago de las Vegas workshop in Havana. She painted murals for public buildings, including the ones splayed on the façades of the Ministry of the Interior HQs in the Revolution Square and the Habana Libre Hotel, the Jose Miguel Gomez School in Havana and the Normal School of Santa Clara, plus a transportable mural for El Caney, in eastern Cuba. In 1968, she received the National Award for 30 years dedicated to the arts.