We have chosen to separate Africana from the other notebooks. What would Black Painting be without African aesthetics? It began in Cuba, inspired by Abakuá symbols, and soon expanded its research to include both classical and contemporary African visual culture. The aim was to identify stylistic features without falling into the (pseudo) mysticism that so appealed to Western artists in the early 20th century. This work  brings together the three shores of the Atlantic: the American, the European, and the African, the latter being the least known and least recognized. If beyond this transatlantic dimension it has a drive to the universal – a somehow vague notion – it is unconceivable without its integration of African esthetics.

Africana is divided into a section presenting part of the painter’s visual documentation and a section bringing together sketches of works. The visual documentation is complemented by books and catalogs from the painter’s library. The library does not contain a large number of titles (although it does include a few classics of African-American literature), but like the other materials, it reveals a perceptive and empathetic gaze, seasoned by the experience of Black people in a diasporic context, both in Cuba and in his European exile.

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