21.1.2026

10:30 AM – 10:45 AM

Introduction

Adriano Pedrosa, Artistic Director, MASP

Nina Volz, Head of International Programs, AWARE

10:45 AM – 1 PM

OCHY CURIEL

Decolonial Epistemologies. Between Museum Institutions and Political Autonomy

In this presentation, I propose to reflect on the emerging tensions that arise when decolonial epistemologies are co-opted by institutions, including museums, that support a liberal multiculturalism that celebrates difference but does not deconstruct colonial power relations. After that, I will present the experience of decolonial feminist schools carried out by the Grupo Latinoamericano de Estudios, Formación y Acción Feminista (GLEFAS) in different locations in Abya Yala as autonomous proposals that materialize the decolonization of knowledge.

ANGÉLICA M. SÁNCHEZ BARONA

Natural History and Painting Manuals in the Viceroyalty of New Granada: Erasing and Constructing Africa in Other Lands 

The second half of the 18th century witnessed the consolidation of what was then called Natural History—a scientific framework that legitimized the hierarchization of humanity by incorporating stereotypes constructed through otherness. In this presentation, I analyze the naturalist ideas that circulated during this period concerning Africa and its inhabitants, as well as the lowland regions of the Viceroyalty of New Granada, a Spanish colony in the American continent that encompassed what are now Colombia, Panama, Ecuador, and Venezuela. By studying the allegories of Africa found in drawing and painting manuals and the descriptions produced by naturalists of the territories they visited, this research shows how the interaction between visual culture and Natural History contributed to the perpetuation of harmful images and imaginaries—both of the bodies of Black women and of territories with predominantly Afro-descendant populations in the Latin American countries that formed part of the viceroyalty.

ALINE MIKLOS

Censorship and Art in Brazil and Argentina after Redemocratization: When Gender and Religion Clash

Forty years after the end of military dictatorships in Brazil and Argentina, actions of censorship of works of art are still performed, often motivated by political, religious, and gender disputes. This speech analyzes cases from the 21st century in which artistic productions were censored or subjected to censorship attempts because they addressed relations of gender and the Catholic religion. The research starts by identifying episodes that occurred in both countries and comparatively analyzing their social, legal, and institutional contexts. The methodology combines documentary survey, review of public debates, and examination of narrative strategies employed by artists and censorship agents. The results show that, despite democratic consolidation, the controversy surrounding gender representations linked to the Catholic imaginary remains a sensitive area; likewise, they reveal persistent tensions related to freedom of expression, authoritarian memory, and contemporary disputes for cultural legitimacy.

Mediated by: Nina Volz, AWARE

1 PM – 2:30 PM

Break

2:30 PM – 4:45 PM

KENCY CORNEJO 

Central American Art: Visual Disobedience and Art Histories Otherwise 

The region of Central America has long been overshadowed by its histories of colonialism and as a target of the US empire. Consequently, popular representations of the isthmus reinforce a narrative of tragedy and victimhood. Meanwhile, its art narratives have been excluded from the dominant canons of art history. Yet beyond omission, what is the correlation between the erasure of a people’s creativity and a negation of a people’s humanity? A discussion of visual coloniality sets the stage for a theorization of visual disobedience as a tactic of resistance from a post-war Central American region. Through visual disobedience—as a defiance to both nation-states and visual coloniality—artists theorize and expose the region’s most pressing issues at the intersection of race, gender, sexuality, citizenship, and criminalization. A focus on Black, Indigenous, nonbinary, and women artists in this context reveals both epistemic and political interventions, and the possibility for art histories otherwise.

ERICA MOIAH JAMES 

Out of Sight: Illuminating Architectures of Visibility and Meaning in Louis Rigaud’s 19th-Century Haitian Portraits

This paper looks at how changes in disciplinary approaches to 19th-century portraits of Haitian leaders by the artist Louis Rigaud (from history paintings to ethnographic objects to modern art) transformed their research, exhibition, and collection value. In the process, it uncovers what becomes visible beyond Western disciplinary boundaries of art history, while modeling a more prismatic way of seeing.

DANIELLE ALMEIDA 

Toward a Laryngeal Epistemology: Eshu and Art in the Voice of Black Latin American Singers

This work proposes a reflection on the leading role of Black singers in 20th-century Latin American music, understanding their voices as an epistemic framework of memory, resistance, and production of aesthetic and political meaning. To support this approach, the research employs the figure of Eshu, a Yoruba Orisha redefined in the diasporic context, linked with communication and rhythm, as the conceptual foundation of a “laryngeal epistemology.” From this perspective, the larynx – as a physical and symbolic space for vocal emission – is regarded as a means of expression involving body, culture, and spirituality, in which singing and speaking function as vectors of asé (vital force) and òfò (enchanting power of words). Thus, the voice of these artists is analyzed as a weapon-tool capable of tensioning and denouncing colonial, racist, and patriarchal oppression. It is noteworthy that, although the research uses Yoruba references as an analytical approach, it does not intend to homogenize the diverse cultural backgrounds of Latin America, when examining the careers and repertoires of Toña La Negra (Mexico), Mercedita Valdés (Cuba), Elza Soares (Brazil), and Victoria Santa Cruz (Perú) as living archives of the Black diaspora.

Mediated by: Glaucea Helena de Britto, Assistant Curator, MASP

5 PM — 6 PM

Conference

COCO FUSCO 

How does a woman speak for herself when she stands for a nation? 

My presentation will be about Afro-Cuban women artists and the specific conditions they contend with. Although my focus will be on visual artists, it is crucial to acknowledge that the iconic representations of Black Cubans and Black Cuban women first emerged in literature and then were popularized in performing arts, cinema, and tourism. I will describe the historical and political constraints that have impacted artistic treatment of racial and gender identity in Cuba in recent decades to understand how the revolution generated the parameters of acceptable creative expression. I will show how the decriminalization of religion, the economic hardships that began in the 1990s, and the tourism boom in the past thirty years have affected the artistic choices of Afro-Cuban artists in general and Afro-Cuban women in particular. In my presentation, I will consider works by such artists as Belkis Ayon, Magdalena Campos, Gertrudis Rivalta, Susana Pilar, and Laura Gilbert.

Mediated by: Amanda Carneiro, Curator, MASP

ALINE MIKLOS
Aline Miklos is a researcher and program manager with international work in human rights, cultural rights, transitional justice, and guarantees of the rule of law. Holding a Ph.D. in Law and Social Sciences and a Master’s degree in Art History from the École des Hautes Études en Sciences Sociales (EHESS), she developed her career focusing on freedom of expression and artistic creation, censorship, issues related to gender, and ethnic-racial minorities. In addition to her academic work, Aline has over ten years of experience in the field of human rights and is currently Coordinator of Advocacy and Rule of Law Guarantees at the Vladimir Herzog Institute.

ANGÉLICA M. SÁNCHEZ BARONA

Historian, Economist, and Art Historian specializing in Colonial History, the History of the Arts and Cultures of the eighteenth century, Afrodiasporic Feminisms, and Intersectionality. She is a PhD candidate in African and African American Studies at Harvard University. She is affiliated with the Afro-Latin America Research Institute (ALARI) at Harvard and with the Interseccionalidades research group of the Casa Cultural El Chontaduro Association in Cali, Colombia. She is co-editor (with Vergara-Figueroa and de la Fuente) of the collection Afro-Colombian Studies: Essential Readings (2025), and has published articles and book chapters such as Instruments of Persuasion: Painting Manuals and the Visual Construction of Africa and Africans in the Viceroyalty of New Granada, Eighteenth Century (2024), and I Am Free, I Come to Enslave Myself! 1976 (2019). She is currently affiliated with the Dumbarton Oaks Research Center, which awarded her the William R. Tyler Fellowship for the 2024–2026 period.

COCO FUSCO 

Coco Fusco is an interdisciplinary artist and writer. She is a member of the Academy of Arts and Letters and a Professor of Art at Cooper Union. Fusco is a recipient of numerous awards, including a Guggenheim fellowship, a United States Artists fellowship, a Fulbright fellowship, and a Herb Alpert Award in the Arts. Fusco’s performances and videos have been presented at the 56th Venice Biennale, Frieze Special Projects, Basel Unlimited, three Whitney Biennials (2022, 2008, and 1993), and several other international exhibitions. Her works are in the permanent collections of the Museum of Modern Art, The Art Institute of Chicago, The Walker Art Center, the Centre Pompidou, the Imperial War Museum, and the Museu d’Art Contemporani de Barcelona (MACBA). Fusco is the author of Dangerous Moves: Performance and Politics in Cuba (2015), English is Broken Here: Notes on Cultural Fusion in the Americas (1995), The Bodies That Were Not Ours (2001), and A Field Guide for Female Interrogators (2008).

DANIELLE ALMEIDA

Danielle Almeida works at the intersection of art, education, and strategic management, developing projects addressing economic and racial justice in Latin America. She holds a degree in Music from the Federal University of Pelotas (UFPel) and a Master’s in Education Sciences from the University of Monterrey (UDEM, Mexico). Among other activities, she was a guest teacher and researcher at the Independent Studies Program at the Museu d’Art Contemporani de Barcelona (MACBA) and a researcher at the Academy of the Arts of the World in Germany. Focusing on inclusion policies and affirmative actions for Black populations, she coordinated the first study on the profile of Afro-entrepreneurship in Latin America. She is currently a Content and Institutional Development Manager at Museu das Favelas.

ERIKA MOIAH JAMES

Erica Moiah James is an art historian, curator, and Associate Professor at The University of Miami. She was previously the founding director and chief curator of the National Gallery of the Bahamas and Assistant Professor of Art History and African American Studies at Yale University. Her research focuses on Indigenous, modern, and contemporary art of the Caribbean, Americas, and the African Diaspora. Select publications include Decolonizing Time: Nineteenth Century Haitian Portraiture and the Critique of Anachronism in Caribbean Art (NKA2019); La Luz de Cosas / The Light of Things (El Museo2023), and “Prismatic Blackness: Art, Being and Aesthetics in the Global Caribbean” (2024) in Image of the Black in Latin American and Caribbean Art (HarvardUP2024). Recent curatorial projects include Didier William: nou kite tout sa dèyè (MoCA-NoMi) and Nari Ward: Home of the Brave (Vilcek Foundation). Her current book is entitled After Caliban: Caribbean Art in a Global Imaginary (DUP 2025).

KENCY CORNEJO

Kency Cornejo is an art historian of contemporary art and activism in the Americas. She is an Associate Professor in the Department of Chicana/o & Central American Studies at the University of California, Los Angeles (UCLA). Her research and teaching specializations include art and visual culture of Central America and its diasporas, creative expressions within anti-colonial and anti-racist social movements, and decolonial aesthetics and methodologies in art. Her book, Visual Disobedience: Art and Decoloniality in Central America (Duke University Press, 2024), explores three decades of art and decoloniality in the region and has earned the 2025 Association for the Study of the Arts of the Present (ASAP) Book Prize. Her work has been supported by the Fulbright and Ford Foundations, an Andy Warhol Foundation Arts Writers Grant, and a National Endowment for the Humanities Faculty Award Grant. Kency Cornejo was born to Salvadoran immigrants and raised in Compton, California.

OCHY CURIEL

Ochy Curiel Pichardo was born in the Dominican Republic and lives in Colombia. She is a decolonial feminist activist and co-founder of the Grupo Latinoamericano de Estudios, Formación y Acción Feminista (GLEFAS). She holds a Ph.D. and a Master’s degree in Social Anthropology from the Universidad Nacional de Colombia and is a professor at the same university. She is a singer and songwriter, in addition to having written several articles employing notions of race, class, sex, sexuality, and nation. Among her publications, the following books stand out: La Nación Heterosexual, Análisis del Discurso legal y el Régimen Heterosexual de la Antropología de la Dominación (2013) and Un Golpe de Estado: la Sentencia 168-13. Continuities and discontinuities of racism in the Dominican Republic (2021). She was invited as a speaker at events held on different continents and obtained several types of acknowledgment, such as the Honorary Distinction of the Sociologist for Women in Society (SWS), for her political and theoretical work (2022), and for her excellence in teaching by the Faculty of Human Sciences of the Universidad Nacional de Colombia (2016).