Longshoremen Local 1416 is part of Miami Museum of Contemporary Art of the African Diaspora’s (Miami MoCAAD) public art mural series, Veo Veo, I See I See, Mwen Wè Mwen Wè. Miami MoCAAD's interactive mural honors the International Longshoremen Association (ILA) Local 1416, an essential part of the Overtown community since its founding in 1936. ​The mural, created by Miami-based artist Reginald O'Neal and curated by Donnamarie Baptiste, features QR codes containing oral history videos about Miami’s Black Longshoremen and Overtown. On view at ILA Local 1416 Union Hall, 816 NW 2nd Ave, Miami, FL. Ongoing with corresponding website at murals.miamimocaad.org.

OVERtown: Our Family Tree is part of Veo Veo, I See I See, Mwen Wè Mwen Wè, an interactive public art project exploring Overtown through visual art, storytelling and technology commissioned by Miami MoCAAD and curated by Donnamarie Baptiste. The mural, created by Miami-based artist Anthony “Mojo” Reed II, honors Miami's first Black judge, the late Judge Lawson E. Thomas, who as a lawyer fought fearlessly for civil rights of Black people during the 1940s and 1950s Jim Crow era. Judge Thomas owned the Overtown law office building where the mural incorporates QR codes containing oral history videos about Judge Thomas and Overtown. On view at 1021 NW Second Ave, Miami, FL. Ongoing with corresponding website at murals.miamimocaad.org.

“Strange Fruits'', curated by Yuneikys Villalonga, presents recent work by Marielle Plaisir, a Miami-based multimedia artist. Working in paint, drawing, sculpture, fashion and performance, Plaisir creates intense visual experiences exploring her French-Caribbean heritage against the backdrop of Postcolonialism. In April 2024, Plaisir will present new digital artworks and a multimedia piece that were commissioned by the Museum of Contemporary Art of the African Diaspora (Miami MoCAAD) as a recipient of a 2022 New Work Award from the Knight Foundation. Coral Gables Museum, 285 Aragon Avenue Coral Gables, FL. Runs through April 28, 2024.

Chakaia Booker: Surface Pressure celebrates work of multimedia artist Chakaia Booker who is renowned for her expert manipulation of unconventional materials. This exhibit presents her signature sculptures composed of recycled tires alongside innovative creations in printmaking and painting. Sarasota Art Museum Ringling College Museum Campus, 1001 South Tamiami Trail Sarasota, FL 34236. Runs through Oct. 29, 2023.

"Calida Rawles envisions water as a space for Black healing and reimagines the African American community beyond the stories we already know as a part of the United States’ collective history. Merging hyperrealism, poetic abstraction, and the cultural and historical symbolisms of water, Rawles creates unique portraits of Black bodies submerged in and interacting with bright and mysterious bodies of water(...) Rawles delves into the particular experience of Black people in Overtown, a Miami neighborhood that went from a thriving cultural and commercial hub for Black people to a community dismantled by gentrification, systemic racism, and mass displacement."

Purvis Young: A Visionary of Miami’s Cultural Identity highlights the profound legacy of one of Miami’s most significant self-taught artists. Young’s work, painted on discarded wood, doors, and other salvaged materials, portrays the resilience of marginalized communities while drawing from historical struggles and contemporary social injustices. His signature imagery—migrating figures, angelic protectors, and urban landscapes—transforms everyday life into spiritual and political commentary. Deeply rooted in the cultural fabric of Overtown, Young’s paintings serve as both historical documentation and poetic reflections of the Black experience in America.

"Mementos of the Sun" emerges from Mansa's deep reflection over four years, resulting in assemblages that intertwine personal and collective narratives. By repurposing materials like stuffed animals and seashells, he creates poignant commentaries on the African diaspora's experiences, exploring the intersections of memory, loss, and cultural identity. This exhibition invites viewers to engage with the layered complexities of heritage and personal history, offering a space for contemplation and dialogue.

In A Tesseract, A Talisman, Sanford Biggers explores the intersection of past, present, and future through a striking new body of work. His handwoven wool tapestries, created in collaboration with Taller Mexicano de Gobelinos, extend his practice of painting on antique quilts—infusing them with fresh narratives and geometric patterns. Meanwhile, his ceramic sculptures, crafted at the renowned Cerámica Suro in Guadalajara, evoke movement and fluidity, transforming rigid materials into dynamic, billowing forms. Drawing from his ongoing Codex series, Biggers continues his investigation of quilts as historical artifacts—once rumored to be coded guides on the Underground Railroad—by reshaping them into objects that blur time and space. This exhibition, marking twelve years of collaboration with David Castillo Gallery, highlights Biggers’s ability to craft “future ethnographies,” bridging ancestral wisdom with contemporary dialogue.

"poemas de sal y tierra" serves as an evolving space where sentiment, symbolism, and memorabilia converge to be celebrated and reimagined. The exhibition functions like a prose-written diary, with artworks acting as entries that preserve feelings and memories beyond physical artifacts. Artists weave new layers of meaning into inherited stories, places, and objects, transforming memory into an active, unfolding conversation. homework The exhibition explores the concept that individuals both come from and become the places they move through, with salt and soil symbolizing ancestral geographies. Through painting, drawing, sound, film, photography, and sculpture, artists translate ephemeral histories and shifting landscapes into tangible artworks, akin to how poetry reveals the invisible threads of existence.

Mildred Thompson’s artistic journey traversed continents and disciplines, resulting in a body of work that bridges science, music, and abstraction. Thompson's multifaceted practice draws from scientific research and a poetic pursuit of abstraction to explore the limits of perception, visualizing extremes of scale—from the human body and built environments to microscopic particles and the vastness of the cosmos. After relocating from the United States to Germany in the late 1950s, Thompson created surreal, figurative drawings and etchings, often depicting female figures. In the late 1960s and 1970s, her focus shifted to built environments, as seen in her “Wood Pictures” series—abstract minimalist compositions made from found wood, reminiscent of architectural features and facades. Her explorations continued with the “Window Paintings” (1977), where brightly colored, abstracted spaces appear framed by windows. Thompson's works on paper from the 1970s and ’80s highlight her inventive approach to printmaking and drawing, including the intricate intaglio prints of the “Death and Orgasm” series (1978) and expressive watercolors of celestial constellations like Pleiades III (1988). In the 1990s, she delved into invisible forces with paintings inspired by particle physics and quantum mechanics, such as “String Theory” (1999) and “Magnetic Fields” (1991). A significant selection of her “Heliocentric Series” (c. 1990–94) is on display for the first time in over three decades, presented alongside her monumental “Music of the Spheres” (1996) paintings, each depicting a different planet and accompanied by Thompson's original electronic music compositions titled Cosmos Calling.

In A Tesseract, A Talisman, Sanford Biggers explores the intersection of past, present, and future through a striking new body of work. His handwoven wool tapestries, created in collaboration with Taller Mexicano de Gobelinos, extend his practice of painting on antique quilts—infusing them with fresh narratives and geometric patterns. Meanwhile, his ceramic sculptures, crafted at the renowned Cerámica Suro in Guadalajara, evoke movement and fluidity, transforming rigid materials into dynamic, billowing forms. Drawing from his ongoing Codex series, Biggers continues his investigation of quilts as historical artifacts—once rumored to be coded guides on the Underground Railroad—by reshaping them into objects that blur time and space. This exhibition, marking twelve years of collaboration with David Castillo Gallery, highlights Biggers’s ability to craft “future ethnographies,” bridging ancestral wisdom with contemporary dialogue.