CURATORS

CHIEF CURATOR

Lance M Fung

Lance Fung is the chief curator for Fung Collaboratives, an organization that conceives and realizes art exhibitions around the world and its non-profit partner FC Projects. Through both entities, Lance advises, consults and creates public art master plans as well as full implementation. He has been curating large-scale public art exhibitions for decades after closing his successful NYC gallery in 2005 to pursue his curatorial practice. Most recently, Lance curated Fireflies by artist Cai Guo-Qiang as the centennial celebration for the Benjamin Franklin Parkway. Lance also transformed vacant lots in Atlantic City into a much-needed park system through his exhibition Artlantic. These “giant living sculptures” attracted local residents and visiting art enthusiasts to experience art in “green” settings designed by Fung and the participants Diana Balmori, Robert Barry, Peter Hutchinson, Ilya & Emilia Kabakov, Kiki Smith, etc. With his unique curatorial eye, Fung has curated internationally recognized exhibitions such as The Snow Show in 2003, 2004, and 2006, Lucky Number Seven (2008) for the seventh SITE Santa Fe International Biennial, Wonderland (2009-2010), and Nonuments (2014).

He has created other important exhibitions such as Revisiting Gordon Matta-Clark at Next: The Venice Architectural Biennale in Venice, Italy; The Snow Show: Venice at the 50th International Art Exhibition/La Biennale di Venezia; The Ship of Tolerance by Ilya and Emilia Kabakov, in Siwa, Egypt and Dreams and Conflicts–The Viewer’s Dictatorship, in Venice, Italy; Crossing Parallels at the SSamzi Space in Seoul, Korea and Going Home at the Edward Hopper Historical Museum in Nyack, New York.

 
Most importantly, Fung Collaboratives has had the pleasure to commission many artists and architects to realize new, site-specific works.  Norman Foster, Williams & Tsein, Tadao Ando, Yoko Ono, Ernesto Neto, and Rachel Whiteread are only a few of the visionaries that Fung has worked with.  He is currently developing a cultural village as well as Sink, an underwater exhibition about marine conservation, in Bali and a public art exhibition on the San Francisco Bay Trail the encircles the San Francisco bay. He also curates the monthly installation / public art exhibitions for the Art Kiosk in Redwood City, CA.

Fung is a member of the International Association of Curators of Contemporary Art (IKT) and the International Council of Museums (ICOM).

• Fung Collaboratives: www.fungcollaboratives.org

CURATORIAL TEAM

Catherine Cathers Illuminate Coral Gables

CURATOR

Catherine Cathers

Arts & Culture Specialist: The City of Coral Gables

With a vibrant background of arts programming, administration, curation and creation, Cathers’ love of the arts has led her from exhibiting works of her own to administration of generously funded public art commissions and installations. Ms. Cathers is the City of Coral Gables’ Arts & Culture Specialist, administering the City’s annual Cultural Grant and Art in Public Places programs. Her position with the City includes working closely with community stakeholders including private developers seeking to incorporate public art within their projects.

Cathers graduated with honors from Webster University in St. Louis Missouri, where she also worked at the internationally celebrated Saint Louis Art Museum programming music, film, dance, and lectures to compliment Museum exhibitions. Previously, she worked for the Bi-State Development Agency, Arts in Transit, successfully presenting and managing temporary and permanent public art projects for the federal agency. A skilled professional, artist, board member, state and regional grant panelist, grant writer, and mother, Ms. Cathers believes in the power of art to transform, educate, and indulge our senses while enriching our community.

CURATOR

Rosie Gordon Wallace

Rosie Gordon-Wallace, Founding President | Curator, Diaspora Vibe Cultural Arts Incubator since 1996 has initiated and produced transnational creative programs that redefine concepts of “diaspora” including the International Cultural Exchange program, the Caribbean Crossroads Series, the Artist-In-Residence program, an ongoing Contemporary Exhibition program, and numerous community-based outreach projects. The incubator is defined as a nomadic museum, with an archive housed in the Special Collection of the University of Miami. DVCAI brings artistic creation out of the “white cube”, presenting experimental work, collecting data, and shaping the lives of Caribbean emerging artists in Miami and the Caribbean.

The gallery supports the development of new work by resident artists by offering exhibition opportunities, artist talks, think tanks, and other skill-building core values for emerging artists. She is dynamic and unstoppable and continues to create international cultural experiences for Miami artists that add value to our cultural aesthetic and economy with new ways of envisioning contemporary theories of Black Diaspora racial identities and their re-emerging roles in transforming social and political landscapes of the Americas. Rosie curates exhibitions in Miami and throughout the Caribbean. Since 2000 she has curated international exhibitions in, Paris, Jamaica, Barbados, Guadeloupe, and Suriname.

 

She is a 2018 Knight Foundation Champion awardee and curator of the 2019 National YoungArts Miami exhibition. She is a member of the Independent Curators International. Her curatorial research focuses on cultural heritage and memory and their influences on contemporary artistic practice in Miami Florida and the wider Caribbean spaces. November 14, 2019, Rosie curated the Inter | Sectionality: Diaspora Art from The Creole City exhibition at the Corcoran School of Art and Design which runs through March 20, 2020.

 

• Diaspora Vibe Cultural Arts Incubator: www.dvcai.org

 

ART ADVISORY COUNCIL

David Y. Chang

Frost Professor of Art & Chair of the Department of Art and Art History, Florida International University

David Y. Chang, MFA, is Frost Professor of Art and Chair of the Department of Art and Art History at Florida International University, a renowned artist and award-winning professor. Classically trained in the Beaux-Arts tradition, his education includes the École Nationale Supérieure des Beaux-Arts, Paris, France, the Cambridge University, England, the Academy of Fine Arts, Shanghai Jiao Tong University, Shanghai, China, and Florida International University. Since joining FIU in 1986, Professor Chang has been teaching visual arts education theories and practices, classical drawing and painting, as well as visual analysis for over three decades. He is the Founding Director of the Academy of Portrait and Figurative Art. His artworks have been collected internationally. He is the Chair of the Florida Artists Group (FLAG-Area1) – Florida’s oldest and most prestigious professional artists association which requires a juried membership. Professor Chang has been awarded the Florida Higher Education Art Educator Prize as well as the Florida Art Education Distinguished Service Award.

Illuminate Coral Gables (ICG) brings to light high caliber artistic and educational experiences for South Florida community and beyond. It is a manifestation of the desire and appreciation of art by nationally and internationally renowned artists as well as emerging artists.

- David Y. Chang

Carol Damian

Art Historian,

Former Director & Chief Curator: the Patricia and Phillip Frost Art Museum, Florida International University

Dr. Carol Damian is an Art Historian, former Professor of Art History in the School of Art and Art History, and former Director and Chief Curator of the Patricia and Phillip Frost Art Museum at Florida International University.  A specialist in Latin American and Caribbean Art, her most recent work has been with Latin American Women and the Cuban exile artists.  Dr. Damian has contributed to numerous publications and lectures frequently.  Recognized in the South Florida art community for her knowledge and experience, she serves on a number of boards, including the Art in Public Places Trust for Miami Dade.  Dr. Damian has curated many notable exhibitions and is a Cultural Properties expert and consultant for US Customs/Homeland Security (ICE).  Presently, she is the Curator of the Jay I.Kislak Collection at the Freedom Tower, the Chapel of La Merced Colonial Collection, and the exhibit of “Carlos Estévez: Cities of the Mind” at the Lowe Art Museum. 

Coral Gables is one of the most unique and beautiful communities in the United States, and art has always been part of its culture, beginning with the architectural details found throughout, and nature’s art in the trees that shade our lovely streets. It is wonderful to continue to activate the city with art and the Illuminate project promises to bring the city into an international spotlight for everyone to enjoy.

- Carol Damian

Jill Johnson Deupi, JD, PHD

Beaux Arts Director

Chief Curator: the Lowe Art Museum, University of Miami

Dr. Jill Deupi is the Beaux Arts Director and Chief Curator of the Lowe Art Museum (University of Miami). Prior to assuming this position in 2014, Deupi was Director and Chief Curator of University Museums at Fairfield University, where she was also an Assistant Professor of Art History. Her prior professional experience includes work at the Royal Academy of Arts, the Art Institute of Chicago, the Snite Museum of Art, the National Gallery of Art, and the Wallace Collection.

 

The recipient of a prestigious two-year “Rome Prize,” Dr. Deupi wrote her doctoral dissertation on art and cultural politics in 18th-century Naples. She is a Fellow of the American Academy in Rome, the Leading Change Institute, and the Getty Leadership Institute. Deupi is also a Trustee of the Association of Art Museum Directors (AAMD) and chair of this organization’s academic art museum affinity group. 

Illuminate Coral Gables speaks to the power of public art to delight, inspire, connect, and re-energize. Through its eight distinctive commissions from a range of artists who are united by their commitment to excellence and the captivating quality of their work, ICG could not come at a better time in our collective history; it is a light, both literal and metaphorical, at the end of the very dark tunnel in which we have all huddled throughout 2020, the harbinger of a new day and brighter tomorrow.

- Jill Johnson Deupi, JD, PHD

Maritza Lacayo

Curatorial Assistant & Publications Coordinator: Pérez Art Museum Miami (PAMM)

Maritza Lacayo is Curatorial Assistant and Publications Coordinator at Pérez Art Museum Miami (PAMM) since March 2017. At PAMM she has organized George Segal: Abraham’s Farewell to Ishmael (2019), Polyphonic: Celebrating PAMM’s Fund for African American Art (2020, co-organized with René Morales), and The Artist as Poet: Selections from PAMM’s Collection (2021), and has numerous forthcoming exhibition projects. Lacayo has also assisted in the coordination and production of dozens of exhibitions at PAMM. She has managed various publications and exhibition catalogues for PAMM including Dara Friedman: Perfect Stranger (2017); On the Horizon: Contemporary Cuban Art from the Jorge M. Pérez Collection (2017); william cordova: now’s the time: narratives of southern alchemy (2018); Ebony G. Patterson…while the dew is still on the roses… (2018); The Other Side of Now: Foresight in Contemporary Caribbean Art (2019); Beatriz González: A Retrospective (2019); and Lynne Gelfman: Grids (2021). Lacayo curated the Exhibition of Works by 2019 YoungArts Winners (Regional) and the National Winners exhibition in 2020. Lacayo has contributed writing to numerous platforms and most recently, her essay, The Haziness of Memory, was published on the event of artist Vaughn Spann’s first monograph and exhibition at Almine Rech Gallery, Brussels. She holds a BA in Art History from the American University of Paris and a Master of Letters (MLitt) in Modern and Contemporary Art and Art World Practice from the University of Glasgow, Scotland (Christie’s Education Program). 

Photo Credit: Pedro Wazzan

Lorie Mertes

Executive Director: Locust Projects

Lorie Mertes, a South-Florida native, has served as executive director of Locust Projects since May 2017. She has more than twenty-five years of experience as an arts administrator and curator at museums and non-profit visual arts organizations. Most recently, she was Director of Public Programs at the National Museum of Women in the Arts (NMWA) in Washington, DC where she launched a new public program initiative focused on women and the arts as catalysts for social change. She served as Curatorial Consultant at the McColl Center for Art + Innovation in Charlotte, NC and was Director and Chief Curator of The Galleries at Moore College of Art and Design in Philadelphia. She was the Curator and Assistant Director for Special Projects at the Miami Art Museum, now Pérez Art Museum of Miami, where, in addition to serving as curator from 1994 to 2006, she was a senior manager responsible for new programs, publications, and outreach initiatives to increase visibility and engage new audiences.

Jordana Pomeroy

Director: the Patricia & Phillip Frost Art Museum, Florida International University

Jordana Pomeroy is the Director of the Patricia & Phillip Frost Art Museum at Florida International University and an adjunct professor in the department of art and art history. She currently serves on the board of the Association of Academic Museums and Galleries. She received her B.A. from Bryn Mawr College and holds a Ph.D. in art history from Columbia University. Dr. Pomeroy wrote her dissertation on the sale of the Orléans Collection and the origins of London’s National Gallery, which lead to a post-doctoral fellowship at the Paul Mellon Centre for Studies in British Art. Dr. Pomeroy held the position of Chief Curator at the National Museum of Women in the Arts and served as a Professorial Lecturer in the museums studies M.A. program at Georgetown University.