Although he grew up during the era of the Mexican Revolution, his time in Europe in the 1920s and early 1930s, set his aesthetics towards the avant-garde movements of that continent, rather than towards Mexican muralism, making him a part of the Los Contemporáneos or “Grupo sin grupo.” His work in art and theater influenced each other, with his art having theatrical themes and his theater having emphasis on sets and visual cues.
Lazo retired from art in 1950, after the death of his long-time partner poet Xavier Villaurrutia, supposedly never painting or writing again.
[3] He began his art studies at the Escuela al Aire Libre de Pintura in Santa Anita, founded by Alfredo Ramos Martínez in 1913[1][4] In 1917, he briefly attended the Escuela Nacional de Bellas Artes, along with Rufino Tamayo, Julio Castellanos and Gabriel Fernández Ledesma, studying under Saturnino Herrán .
[7] At this time, he also became interested in theater, learning set design and stage machinery with Charles Dullin of Théâtre de l'Atelier.
Salvador Novo wrote that he slowly died over the next twenty years, in part because as the last heir he was overwhelmed by the wealth he was inheriting from his relatives.
[2] When he returned, he continued painting and became a drawing teacher at the Escuela Nacional de Pintura, Escultura y Grabado "La Esmeralda".
[3] After the production of the play El caso de don Juan Manuel in 1948, Lazo was considered one of Mexico major playwrights along the lines of Rodolfo Usigli and Villaurrutia.
[2] Collaborating with Xavier Villaurrutia, he translated as well as plays which include Le secret by Henry Bernstein, The Daughter of Lorio by Gabriele D’Annunzio and Each in His Own Way by Luigi Pirandello.
[2] In 2009, the Centro Cultural Universitario Tlatelolco held a retrospective of his called Las cenizas quedan, which included over 100 pieces of his artwork.
[3] Lazo's aesthetics were far more affected by trends in Europe, especially surrealism, because of his time there, which gave him influences such as Max Jacob and Robert Desnos.
[5] Artists along this line include Rufino Tamayo, Abraham Ángel, Antonio Ruiz El Corcito, Miguel Covarrubias, Carlos Pellicer, José Gorostiza, Salvador Novo, Jorge Cuesta, Gilberto Owen, Xavier Villarrutia, Carlos Orozco Romero, Julio Castellanos, Alfonso Michel, Jesús Guerrero Galván, María Izquierdo and to a certain extent, Frida Kahlo .
[10][12] He said “Size and sweat interest no one, what matters are the message that it can give and the impact it creates.”[12] He painted only on canvas, with the largest of these only 1.5 meters high, works created in 1924 for the Spanish embassy in Mexico, made that large only so that the public could see them.
[3] His main influences were Max Ernst and Giorgio de Chirico, best evident in inks, watercolors and collages made in the 1920s and 1930s.
[8] His artwork often had a dreamlike and fantasy quality, along with melancholy and disturbing such as Tras de la cruz está el diabo (1935) (Behind the cross is the devil) .
El caso de Juan Manuel was written by Lazo, set in colonial times with a mass murderer killing young criollo men.