Wifredo Lam No Longer Waits by the Coatroom
An artwork’s position in the museum, both spatially and interpretively, matters. It was this architecture of visibility that fueled critic John Yau’s landmark essay “Please wait by the coatroom” (1988), titled after the corridor where the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) once relegated Cuban artist Wifredo Lam’s painting “La Jungla (The Jungle)” (1943). For years, the painting hung in the lobby beside…















