MoCA-Americas Brings Landmark Exhibition to Marco Island in Cultural Exchange Across Coasts. On May 5, 2025, the Museum of Contemporary Art of the Americas (MoCA-Americas) opens a new chapter in its ongoing mission to foster cultural exchange across the hemisphere by launching a landmark collaborative exhibition at the Marco Island Center for the Arts. Running through July 1, this exhibition marks a rare and important opportunity for audiences on Florida’s southwest coast to experience highlights from MoCAA’s growing permanent collection. Featuring an intergenerational group of Latin American and Caribbean artists, the show is part of a long-term institutional exchange between both organizations, one that aims to strengthen the visibility of underrepresented artistic narratives...
What does it mean today to speak of lineage, of ancestry, of descent? Is it a burden, a continuity, a scar, a myth? This exhibition offers no definitive answers, but instead opens a fertile space for visual inquiry. In a time when identities are rapidly reshaped and familial narratives fracture or fade, the works brought together in Descendencias suggest a return to the intimate—not as nostalgia, but as a gesture of critical re-engagement with what still defines us, often beyond our will.
The island as body, the body as frontier, the home as archive, intimacy as resistance. This exhibition traces a dual journey: that of Lianet Martínez, working from Cuba, and Liza Camilo, based in the United States—and that of the viewer, who is invited to traverse the visual and emotional terrain they lay before us. Both artists begin with the female body as a site of memory, politics, and transformation, placing it at the heart of their creative inquiry. In their hands, the body is not mere representation—it becomes matter, language, an intimate gesture, and a collective mirror. Through sculpture and photography, the two artists construct a space where personal narratives echo larger cultural histories, and where the intimate becomes a portal to the universal.
Cuba is an archipelago nestled in the Antilles of the Caribbean Sea. Its modest size, however, belies the political and historical weight it has carried in the region and across much of the Global South. Its unique political trajectory has left a profound imprint on the historical and ideological evolution of the Americas for nearly a century. Following the triumph of the Cuban Revolution in 1959, the nation veered from its previous course and aligned itself ideologically and structurally with the Eastern Bloc, under the leadership of the now-defunct Union of Soviet Socialist Republics. At that time, the world was starkly divided into two distinct economic and social systems—two antagonistic blocs that regarded each other with disdain and engaged in relentless ideological confrontation.
What began in Brazil as a bold and visionary endeavor to shed light on Cuban diasporic art now finds a new and vibrant chapter in Miami. This exhibition at the Museum of Contemporary Art of the Americas (MoCA-Americas) is not a reprise, but rather a natural and necessary evolution—a living continuation of a broader and still-unfolding curatorial project that is only beginning to reveal its full depth and potential.
From March 7 to April 11, 2025, the Museum of Contemporary Art of the Americas (MoCA-Americas) was honored to present 'Threading the Americas from North to South', a landmark juried exhibition organized in collaboration with the Fiber Artists Miami Association (FAMA). The exhibition was open to the public for nearly the entire month of March through mid-April.
While they hail from different countries, these artists—except for one based in Bilbao—have made Miami their home, contributing to the city's dynamic creative landscape. This exhibition not only showcases their individual artistic voices but also underscores the role of abstraction as a universal language that transcends borders and traditions. Together, their works form a rich visual dialogue that reflects both shared sensibilities and diverse cultural perspectives.
This exhibition foregrounds his unique perspective, offering an incisive glimpse into the cultural narratives of an artist singularly forged by his socio-political milieu—a narrative seldom explored in South Florida. Beyond its undeniable artistic merit, this exhibition offers an extraordinary opportunity to immerse oneself in the tangible expression of those artists who endured—and ultimately transcended—the imposition of Socialist Realism, a doctrine advanced in the last century with remarkable severity by states aligned with the Soviet bloc.
Under the thoughtful curatorship of Marisa Caichiolo, the event highlighted the transformative power of art to connect humanity and envision a more harmonious and interconnected world. Art was presented as a catalyst for global change, resonating across boundaries and cultures, and inspiring collaborative efforts toward a brighter future. This vision echoed the ongoing work of both MoCA-Americas and the Fine Arts Ceramic Center.
The overarching program was conceived by Nubia Abají, who was also responsible for the selection of artists participating in the MoCAA exhibition. Each artist worked from their individual vision, free from constraints and guided solely by the dictates of their soul. The collection of works collectively formed a celebration of unique voices, embodying the very spirit of The Bright Foundation and HISPAFEST.
The Kendall Art Cultural Center (KACC), dedicated the past six years to the preservation and promotion of contemporary art and artists, and to the exchange of art and ideas throughout Miami and South Florida, as well as abroad. Through an energetic calendar of exhibitions, programs, and its collections, KACC provides an international platform for the work of established and emerging artists, advancing public appreciation and understanding of contemporary art.
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The Rodríguez collection is a blueprint of Cuban art and its diaspora. Within the context of the new MoCA-Americas the collection becomes an invaluable visual source for Diaspora identity. It represents a different approach to art history to try to better understand where we come from to better know where we are heading.
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