MOCA Jacksonville presents Maria Magdalena Campos-Pons lecture
MOCA Jacksonville is pleased to present renowned artist María Magdalena Campos-Pons, in the second lecture of our Fall BAM Lecture Series, to take place at 7 p.m. on Tuesday, Nov. 9, via Zoom. The “Black Art Matters (BAM)” lecture series brings current nationally acclaimed Black artists, curators and historians that speak through their work to the issues of our time.
Maria Magdalena Campos-Pons (La Vega, Cuba 1959) is an artist who has been at the forefront of developing a practice that combines and crosses diverse artistic expressions, including photography, painting, sculpture, film, video, and performance, in order to investigate the intersections of race, gender and memory. Campos-Pons' work is deeply autobiographical and embedded in the African legacy in Cuban and African American diasporic identity, often referring to Catholic and Santerían symbols and practices. In addition, Campos-Pons has founded or co-founded several important non-profit arts organizations including the Intermittent Rivers, a Biennial Project in Matanzas, Cuba; the Engine for Art Democracy and Justice, a collaboration between Vanderbilt and Fisk Universities and the Frist Art Museum; and When We Gather, a multi-faceted art project celebrating the elemental role women have played in the United States. She is also the recipient of the endowed Cornelius Vanderbilt Chair at Vanderbilt University in Nashville, Tennessee.
Campos-Pons has had solo exhibitions at the Museum of Modern Art in New York, the Indianapolis Museum of Art, and the National Gallery of Canada, among other distinguished institutions. She has presented solo performances commissioned by institutions that include the Guggenheim Museum and the Smithsonian’s National Portrait Gallery.
“Campos-Pons’ artistic practice is a great example of the work made by black artists in our time, at the forefront of the dismantling of traditional art categories and practices; mixing and breaking and diffusing the boundaries in between, while bringing to the fore and helping us question political and social issues of our time,” said MOCA Senior Curator Ylva Rouse. “The BAM lecture series aims to bring the voices of these artists to the Jacksonville community and contribute to important dialogue on a local as well as a national level.”
“We are honored to welcome María Magdalena Campos-Pons to MOCA to present as part of our BAM lecture series”, said Caitlín Doherty, MOCA’s Executive Director. “BAM is an important part of MOCA’s ongoing commitment to addressing issues of diversity, equity and inclusion, through our programming, our working and our engagement with issues most pertinent to our time and place.”
Upcoming BAM lectures include Charles Gaines, Kalup Linzy, Odili Donald Odita, Ebony M. Patterson, and Tschabalala Self.
The BAM Lecture Series is free of charge, kindly sponsored by The Jessie Ball duPont Fund.
To register, visit the Eventbrite page.
For more information, visit the MOCA website.