“When I was a student at Spelman College, my painting instructor was Dr. Arturo Lindsay. He was Panamanian and had started an artist-residency program in this little coastal village called Portobelo, about 90 minutes from Panama City, for the students to visit. It gave us the opportunity to paint outside, to paint the greenery and the ocean, and to set up anywhere. We stayed with Sandra Eleta, an internationally renowned photographer who had a house in the village and was known locally as the Gran Bruja. She was an amazing storyteller. Over the course of my first 24 hours there, I fell in love with the place. It was only my second time on an airplane, and, as a Black woman, experiencing this Afro-Panamanian area was a powerful introduction to the African diaspora. When the Spaniards were transporting enslaved people to the area in the 17th and 18th centuries, they would dock in Portobelo overnight. When they took the enslaved off the boat, they would bring them to this dungeon, this hole that they'd dug, which had a small opening that let in light and air.
At one point, there was a rebellion in that cave, and everyone inside escaped and hid deep in the jungle; some of their descendants still live in the village. When we found out about the history there, my friends Calida and Michelle and I decided that we wanted to check out the cave. Michelle was standing under the hole that let the sun in, and I turned to look at her, and I was like, Holy shit. ‘Calida, look at Michelle; what do you see?’ And she said she saw lavender. It looked like this aura surrounding her whole body. So then I went under the light, and together they both said, ‘Blue and gold.’ Calida's aura was all white. It was the craziest thing. We ran back and had Arturo, Sandra, and the other students return to the cave, but then nothing happened. But we know what we saw, and it was just magical. The spirit of the village, the people—everything about that place was inspiring. I've been back five times.”
Amy Sherald's portrait of former First Lady Michelle Obama is currently on view at the Los Angeles County Museum of Art, the third of five stops on the nationwide Obama Portraits Tour. This article appeared in the January/February 2022 issue of Condé Nast Traveler. Subscribe to the magazine here.
