Carlos Alfonzo

El loco duerme tambien - Mad One Also Sleeps, 1986

Carlos Alfonzo Born in Havana, 1950. "In Cuba I was a well known artist. I had found a formula --swarms of little figurines and the integration of literary texts--through which I could deal with many themes without raising suspicion or criticism. Painters younger than I were told that I was something like the limit of what was allowed to go beyond could cause problems with the cultural authorities. When I arrived in the United States it took me more than a year to start painting again. The arrival, the trip from the Port of Mariel, were a shock. My fundamental search has been in the structural form how to paint an image, how to let the hand go. This has been my only preoccupation, since I have never had conceptual conflicts with my work. My interest as a painter is to create new symbols, rather than employ conventional imagery. My identification with religion is that of creator more than interpreter. The symbology is important the tongue for me represents oppression; the cross--and I use many crosses in my work-- has mystical connotations, it represents o spiritual balance, sacrifice; the tears are a symbol of exile. My paintings hove to do with my exile, with my personal drama as I see it.