Flow States– LA TRIENAL 2024
Flow States – LA TRIENAL 2024 is El Museo del Barrio’s second large-scale survey of Latinx contemporary art. Organized by El Museo’s chief curator Rodrigo Moura, curator Susanna V. Temkin, and guest curator María Elena Ortiz, the exhibition will feature 33 participating artists working across the United States, Puerto Rico, and—for the first time—extending into new geographies that reflect the complexities of diasporic flows, with artists based in the Americas, the Caribbean, Europe, and Asia.
Emphasizing plurality and a sense of movement, the title, Flow States, is a pun on creative focus and the fluidity of geographic boundaries and cultural exchanges. This phrase connects to diasporic themes—broadly defined as a dispersion, scattering, and flux of populations, languages, and cultures—that inform the exhibition. The selected artists share interests related to transformation, porosities of landscape and the built environment, spiritual connections, collective memories, hybrid belongings, and material exchanges. This edition builds on the framework of the critically acclaimed ESTAMOS BIEN – LA TRIENAL 20/21, the museum’s inaugural survey of Latinx contemporary art—the first of its kind in the United States. Flow States will be accompanied by a fully illustrated, bilingual publication.
ABOUT THE CURATORS
Rodrigo Moura
Rodrigo Moura is a curator, writer, and editor currently serving as Chief Curator at El Museo del Barrio in New York. At El Museo, Moura has curated Cuerpo: Carlos Martiel (2024), ESTAMOS BIEN – LA TRIENAL 20/21, and Raphael Montañez Ortiz – A Contextual Retrospective (2022). Previously, he was the Adjunct Curator of Brazilian Art at Museu de Arte de São Paulo Assis Chateaubriand (MASP), where he curated or co-curated exhibitions such as Djanira: Picturing Brazil (2019), Melvin Edwards: Lynch Fragments (2018), Images of the Aleijadinho (2018), and Who’s Afraid of Teresinha Soares? (2017). Moura also served as Artistic Director of Instituto Inhotim (Minas Gerais, Brazil) between 2014 and 2015, where he was also curator from 2004 to 2013.
María Elena Ortiz
María Elena Ortiz is a Curator at the Modern Art Museum of Fort Worth, where she curated Surrealism and Us: Caribbean and African Diaspora Art since 1940 (2024) and Jammie Holmes: Make the Revolution Irresistible (2023). Previously, she was a Curator at the Pérez Art Museum Miami (PAMM), where she organized group shows such as Allied with Power: African and African Diaspora Art from the Jorge M. Pérez Collection (2020) and The Other Side of Now: Foresight in Caribbean Art (2020), as well as solo exhibitions with Firelei Báez, Ulla von Brandenburg, william cordova, Teresita Fernández, José Carlos Martinat, Carlos Motta, and Beatriz Santiago Muñoz. At PAMM, Ortiz founded the Caribbean Cultural Institute, a curatorial platform dedicated to Caribbean art, and worked to grow the museum’s collection by securing works by Simone Leigh, Bisa Butler, Bony Ramirez, and others.
Susanna V. Temkin
Susanna V. Temkin is a Curator at El Museo del Barrio in New York and holds a PhD from the Institute of Fine Arts at New York University. At El Museo, she has curated or co-curated exhibitions such as Cuerpo: Carlos Martiel (2024), Something Beautiful: Reframing La Colección (2023–2024), DOMESTICANX (2022), Juan Francisco Elso: Por América (2022), ESTAMOS BIEN – LA TRIENAL 20/21, and Culture and the People: El Museo del Barrio, 1969–2019 (2019), among others. Prior to joining El Museo, Temkin was an Assistant Curator at Americas Society in New York and the Research and Archive Specialist at Cecilia de Torres, Ltd., where she co-authored the digital catalogue raisonné of artist Joaquín Torres-García. Her essays and reviews have been published in exhibition catalogues and magazines, including The Metropolitan Museum of Art’s Alice Neel: People Come First, Rutgers, Art Review, and The Burlington Magazine.
ABOUT THE CATALOGUE
Flow States – LA TRIENAL 2024 is accompanied by a fully illustrated, 360-page catalogue
with curatorial essays and newly commissioned short essays on participating artists by
invited collaborators. Contributors include Chloë Courtney, Raquel Gutiérrez, Jennifer
Inacio, Elena Ketelsen González, Mia Lopez, Dessane Lopez Cassell, Zuna Maza, Serubiri
Moses, Yxta Maya Murray, Marina Reyes Franco, and Julián Sánchez González. Edited by
Rodrigo Moura, María Elena Ortiz, and Susanna V. Temkin. Designed by Elaine Ramos
and Flavia Castanheira, Estúdio Gráfico, São Paulo. English and Spanish. Published by El
Museo del Barrio, New York.
EXHIBITION CREDITS
Flow States – LA TRIENAL 2024 is made possible by the Jacques and Natasha Gelman Foundation. Leadership support is provided by the Rockefeller Brothers Fund. Major support is provided by the National Endowment for the Arts and Tony Bechara. Generous funding is provided by the Mex-Am Cultural Foundation and the Trienal Council: Patrick Collins, Virginia Cowles Schroth, Agnes Gund, María Eugenia Maury, Ramiro Ortiz Mayorga, Kunal Kishore Shah, Monica Vidal and Joseph Sherman. Additional support is provided by Marilyn Pearl Loesberg, Javier Lumbreras, Isabel and Julio Nazario, Robert and Encarnita Quinlan, and Tracey and Phillip Riese. Public support is provided by the New York City Department of Cultural Affairs.
