THE GENERAL

Born on September 26, 1937, in the Havana town of Guanabacoa, Luis Lorenzo Sosa studied drawing from the age of thirteen at the Artistic and Literary Lyceum of that unique Havana town. However, his course as a young man was to work as a worker in a towel factory. 

One day in 1960 he was proposed to join a group of cartoonists who made the magazine Mella.

There was Virgilio Martínez, one of the teachers

in the Cuban cartoon. With him and other members

of the almost mythical publication Luis Lorenzo began to outline a style, and precisely,

at Virgilio's proposal, in 1961, he became part of a team for a new magazine: Pionero and was

the maker of his first cover. Three decades of his life he dedicated to that magazine, until

in 1990 it went to Zunzún. 

About his work, Cecilio Avilés, cartoonist

and researcher, has said: «In its pages there are usually general shots that alternate with medium, American or close up shots. But within the frame itself we also see the use of angles that place the characters in different positions. Picados, contrapicados, fields and counterfields are common in its pages. Indeed, your pen becomes a nimble camera constantly roaming in search of the best image.” 

Luis Lorenzo harvested a significant number of characters, within what is called serious comics. In the field of the samurai -very much in vogue in the sixties- he is father

of «Kombey» and «Ronin», the latter with a script shared at the beginning with Juan Padrón.

The author of Elpidio Valdés also owed the Jíbaro scripts that Luis Lorenzo knew how to turn into fascinating mambisa stories.

With a script by Marcelino Ortiz he made his «Capitán Fabricio» and also has the black «Zombo»

a fighter to vindicate his race. 

But, in my opinion, it is in science fiction where Luis made a work that distinguishes him, obviously it is a subject that fascinated him. He adapted numerous tales and stories

of authors from the former Soviet Union. 

Matías Pérez was born on that search path. "Boy, it occurred to me one day, like this,

without further ado, sitting there in my mother-in-law's house. I was thinking about themes for science fiction comics and then suddenly Matías comes to mind...»

Luis Lorenzo told Peglez. 

During 1969, in the Pioneer magazine appeared

Matías's first adventure... It had 17 pages and in it, his father manages to interweave costumbrismo and science fiction in a coherent way. The paintings show nineteenth-century Havana, with its colonial architecture, volunteer guards, and then give way to the imaginary planet Strakon, where Matías, his friend Smerit and Slina develop their stories.

Editorial Abril in 1986 published an edition

of the main adventures of the Portuguese tellero and two years later the Editorial Pablo de la Torriente took out the volume  from the presses

Matías Pérez and other adventures.

The ingenious game of time that develops

Luis Lorenzo gives his story an infinite possibility of storytelling, and another interesting fact is that it is precisely with this character that the artist ventures into humor.

And speaking of humor, cultivating it was one of the singular characteristics of this artist.

Miriam García, a journalist for Pionero magazine, said: «What most caught my attention

it was his humor, with that big mouth.

I told him you must be in Palante.

He was always laughing, making jokes,

they were unconditional people to Pioneer,

to the kids. Losing his sight must have been terrible, he lived to draw, he was a very modest man, very proud of his origins”. 

In turn, for Gladys Gómez, they were “wonderful people, they were always laughing, with good humor on their lips. I joined Pionero as a director, then I was a designer and I always found the General to be a very communicative person». General they called him because of his bearing

and he accepted the nickname because he enjoyed greasing with friends. 

The kind, chivalrous and cheerful man gradually lost his vision until he was almost blind a few months before he died. And even so he visited Pionero to publish his Matías

or advised the young, as always

he did it with his big friendly hand outstretched to help.

(Taken from- http://www.lajiribilla.co.cu/2003/n135_12/vidacuadritos.html, LIFE IN SQUARES, by:
Paquita Armas Fonseca | Havana)