The Arts

Art show to highlight first skyscraper in city

The history of the American Trade Building will be on display through mid-January.

The building was Panama´s tallest when it was erected in the early 1900s.

LA PRENSA

bUILDING art: An exhibition that will open this month will feature works about Panama´s first skyscraper.953099

The six-floor building facing Plaza Herrera in the neighborhood of San Felipe has gone through many changes since it was erected in the 1900s for those who moved to Panama after the canal was finished.

The American Trade Building, considered Panama City´s first skyscraper, was also home to a bank for many years before it fell into disrepair. Later called Greyskull Castle, it was inhabited by gang members and Panama´s poorest families.

The building´s history will be recalled in an art show at La Casona from Dec. 12 to Jan. 19 titled "Greyskull, Memories of a Castle." Five artists will exhibit their paintings and photographs of the building, which will be accompanied by displays that highlight the building´s divergent history.

Some 15 pieces by artists Ian Chan, Yiyi Barra, Raphael Salazar, Alfredo Yi and White Davalos will be on review, along with artifacts from the building.

"It was a building built with luxuries to accommodate the most influential families of those years," said Barra, adding that it was the second building in Panama to have an elevator.

Today, the American Trade Building is being restored to its previous glory and will be converted into a five-star hotel.

The property, designed by the prominent architect Leonardo Villanueva Meyer, was considered one of the gem´s of Casco Viejo, Panama´s old quarter that is now a UNESCO World Heritage site.

The building included offices, apartments and a ballroom. Over the years it would also house a boxing academy and cafes and would continue to house many of Panama´s elite citizens.

It went on the market several years ago with a price tag of $3 million.

That price would have astounded its most recent residents, including gang members who brazenly walked around the neighborhood with their weapons in plain view.

In the 1970s, the building was leased by the government to house victims of fires in the El Chorrillo area. The gang members soon moved in and the building fell into disrepair, becoming a den of drug use and other illicit activites.