2020 marks the 12th anniversary of the Haitian Cultural Arts Alliance’s ongoing exhibition series, Global Caribbean/Borderless Caribbean. It is also an unusual year when the public stands more than ever to benefit from contact with the arts. Social distancing creates a challenge for Art Basel, Miami Art Week as well as all institutions and organizations devoted to the arts in general but yet it presents an opportunity to develop creative solutions.

This year, The Haitian Cultural Arts Alliance with its long term partner, The Little Haiti Cultural Complex will celebrate this partnership by reopening, of course within the parameters dictated by this ongoing pandemic, with various exhibits focusing on their commitments to the visual arts stemming from this community, this city, and the Caribbean region.

Since 2009, Global Caribbean / Borderless Caribbean has been included in Art Basel’s satellite programming and presented at the Little Haiti Cultural Complex’s main gallery. The first Global Caribbean project was proposed by the French Government, curated by artist Edouard Duval Carrié, and presented with the Haitian Cultural Arts Alliance. At that time, the French Government’s Institut Français had just completed a 5-year contemporary arts program focused on Africa. Deciding to do the same for the Caribbean, they reached out to Carrié. He proposed Miami as a home for this new exhibition series — in that very year, a beautiful new facility, the Little Haiti Cultural Center, now called Complex, had just been completed. For the first iteration, Global Caribbean I, Focus on the Caribbean Contemporary Landscape, Carrié wrote: “My aim with this exhibit is not just to show that these islands all have artists worthy of the appellation but more so to underline the universality of their “regional” visions. Whether they are part of well-intentioned cultural directives or they are solo acts whose productions are in defiance of all odds, I want to honor their efforts by presenting them and their works in a pristine new facility, which provides the proper environment to enhance their visuals acts”. Since then, Global Caribbean has expanded as Global Caribbean / Borderless Caribbean, featuring not only Caribbean artists of the archipelago and its surrounding landmass but also those of its diaspora. These major exhibitions included: Kingdom of this World (2011), French West Indies & Guiana (2012), Liquid Knowledge (2016), Visionary Aponte (2017).

Over the years, Global Caribbean / Borderless Caribbean has engaged with multiple countries, organizations, and institutions. Alongside annual exhibitions, we have organized seminars, workshops, and encounters between artists, curators, and researchers to facilitate contemporary cultural dialogues on the Caribbean. All of this occurs within the context of a major international art fair. Miami, as a major intersection point for the Caribbean, is a natural home for this program. Global/Borderless Caribbean has had a significant impact on Miami and the larger contemporary art community by focusing on our neighbors to the south. Many Caribbean artists were first widely seen in these exhibitions, and a conversation around the idea of “Global Caribbean” continues to develop. We have along the years invited guest curators and other academics to formulate what a cultural production from the region could consist of. The goal is to form a dialogue focused on a region whose vibrant visual production is now gaining greater visibility and still may not even see itself as a unified group of places and cultures with a common history.

We thank our many partners such as Miami-Dade County Cultural Affairs, The Knight Foundation, Cultural Services of the French Embassy in the United States amongst so many others for their generous support as well as the Little Haiti Cultural Complex whose director Ms. Sandy Dorsainvil and its cultural advisor Ms. Marie Vickles have shown constant support and dedication to this ongoing program.

Edouard Duval Carrié

HCAA Director

Contemporary Visual Expression: outdoor exhibition at the Little Haiti Cultural Complex
Local Global: indoor exhibition at the Little Haiti Cultural Complex gallery
Dèjá Vu: indoor exhibition at IPC ArtSpace

For more information and images on the artists participating press the button.

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