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| Before and after: at the top, we see a big chunk of Roberto Lewis’s mural missing, and makeshift patches holding the rest of it up; below, the National Theater ceiling before it crumbled. Photos by Anton Rajer |
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| The Panama News |
Vol. 6, No. 19
Panama City, R.P. September 15 - October 5, 2000 |
If nothing is done, the ceiling will fall," University of Wisconsin art professor Anton Rajer wrote, in a letter to Panama’s National Institute of Culture (INAC) many months ago. Things were done — holdovers from the Pérez Balladares administration were fired, a new batch of political hacks were hired, "grave irregularities" were denounced, and promoters who wanted to stage events at the National Theater and other INAC locales were told that payments by check to INAC were unacceptable, that rentals had to be paid by personal checks made out to someone who works at INAC. However, nothing was done about the widening crack in the National Theater ceiling, and during a rehearsal for a dance recital a big chunk of the ceiling, one of Panamanian artist and diplomat Roberto Lewis’s great works, fell into the seating area and broke into 47 pieces.
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| Before and after: at the top, we see a big chunk of Roberto Lewis’s mural missing, and makeshift patches holding the rest of it up; below, the National Theater ceiling before it crumbled. Photos by Anton Rajer |
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"More parts of the ceiling are ready to fall," Rajer warned. To prevent that, what remains has been temporarily shored up with plywood and aluminum.
The disaster’s etiology, according to the Wisconsin art historian and restoration expert, was in rain gutters and downspouts that were left unmaintained and uncleaned since at least Noriega’s times. For lack of simple care, water that should have flowed off of the building and into the storm drains accumulated on the National Theater’s roof, seeping into the plaster ceiling upon which Lewis’s brilliant canvas mural had been glued many decades ago. When the plaster crumbled and fell, it took part of the painting with it.
Rajer, who is likely the world’s top authority on Lewis and his work, isn’t pointing fingers at individuals. "The problem is not so much negligence," he said, "but a lack of understanding of what it takes to maintain such a treasure." The ceiling is not the only problem, he pointed out. "The whole theater needs to be restored. The lack of maintenance is ubiquitous."
Nevertheless, Rajer told about 20 people gathered at Niko’s in Balboa for a September 6 Panama Canal Historical Society meeting that "I am, and continue to be, upbeat." The drains can be cleaned. The plaster can be replaced and the torn canvas re-mounted and touched up. But that would just be a good start. He advocates a two-year theater restoration project, which would have the theater in top condition in time for Panama’s November 2003 centennial. The facility needs new seats and lighting, Rajer notes. Part of the restoration, he urges, should be the creation of a "Museo del Teatro" in one of the building’s rooms. Such a project, he argues, "could be a great educational experience, and not just for Panamanians."
In a way, it would have certain parallels with the recent restoration of the Statue of Liberty in New York harbor. In each case, a work of public art had become one of the symbols of a nation. In both instances, the work was created in Paris, to be installed on the other side of the Atlantic. Both Lady Liberty and the National Theater deteriorated to the point of being dangerous before the people and resources necessary to save them could be mobilized.
Roberto Lewis, the only Panamanian ever admitted to France’s national arts academy, did some of his best work in Panama. The best-known examples are murals at the Normal School in Santiago — now threatened by a building facade, also a great work of architecture, that’s on the verge of collapse — and at Mireya’s current residence, the Palacio de las Garzas. The ceiling and frescoes at the National Theater, however, were painted in Lewis’s Paris studio.
| Professor Rajer has spent a lot of time in France recently, doing research for an illustrated monograph on Lewis and his work that he expects to publish in English, Spanish and French versions in 2004. He has visited the places where Lewis lived and worked, examined old school records, tracked down and photographed little-known Lewis works and come to know the great Panamanian’s French descendants. He has studied the works of Lewis’s teacher, Leon Bonnat, and art at the Louvre, the French National Opera House and at Paris City Hall, all of which clearly influenced the Panamanian master. He went to Brittany, where Lewis spent summers and absorbed lessons from Paul Gauguin’s followers. He even tracked down Lewis’s old palette.
Rajer has been doing similar research in Panama, but finds very different attitudes on this side of the ocean. "I don’t want to be an art dealer. I don’t want to make any money. I just want to take photographs of [Lewis’s] paintings and show them to the world," Rajer told the Historical Society. In France, private owners of Lewis paintings and sculptures are glad to cooperate, in part because they know that if their property is celebrated in a popular coffee table book it will become much more valuable. In Panama, however, private owners of Lewis works don’t understand an art historian’s motives and presume that Rajer must be some sort of hustler looking to relieve them of their treasures. In some cases, Panamanian owners don’t know the value of their Lewis paintings and accordingly do not take care of them or allow people to see them. The Wisconsin professor, here under the auspices of the American Embassy to give a series of lectures and seminars, urges Panamanians to understand what they own, whether privately or as citizens with a stake in the National Theater. "This was not just Sunday painting," he said of the theater. |
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| Roberto Lewis in the Paris studio where he painted the National Theater murals, circa 1907 |
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| Genuine bushmaster oil? Jason Matthew Berger, Alberto Bermudez, Carlos Castrellón and Giancarlo Rivera, a/k/a Big Fat Hen, have been working in Evan Rodaniche's studio and have a new disc to show for it. "Medicine" may or may not cure all that ails ye — it's a mixture of rock influences ranging from head banging to the sensitive, with a good helping of reggae and even a tad of hip hop. The lyrical content is youthful, and though well received by young audiences, leaves plenty of room for growth. The musicianship is tightly professional. One of the advantages of working mostly in English in Panama is that the Censor Board tends to be too lazy to pay attention. One would think that if it were in Spanish, the Brain Police would want to suppress at least the album's tenth cut, "Natural Things that Burn." Check out the band's website at http://www.bigfathen.com . Photos and graphic courtesy of Big Fat Hen |
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