Illuminate Coral Gables show is off after city criticizes artists’ communist sympathies
After a fiery debate in which Coral Gables Mayor Vince Lago claimed that two artists from one of the city’s premier public art exhibits are communist sympathizers, the popular “Illuminate Coral Gables” art show has canceled its 2022 display and its top curator has resigned.
The decision came after the Coral Gables commission Tuesday voted at around midnight to fund part of the show, but only if the exhibit dropped Cuban-born artist Sandra Ramos and world-renowned Chinese artist Cai Guo-Qiang from its list of 20 participants.
“I will continue to support the arts, but not at the expense of democracy and liberty,” Lago said, referring to interviews by the artists that he felt portrayed communist regimes in Cuba and China in a positive light.
“It is very easy to make comments on the record supporting communism and saying that communism is a great idea, but they are here in the United States taking American money,” Lago said. “At the end of the day, that doesn’t bode well for me.”
Ramos lives in Miami. Guo-Qiang lives in New York.
Postponement and resignation
On Thursday, the art event’s board of directors announced that the 2022 show “has been postponed due to extenuating circumstances beyond our control.”
The board’s statement did not make reference to the city’s vote to exclude the two artists or mention the conditional offer from the Coral Gables Commission, which has not been publicly rejected. But the board confirmed that Illuminate’s chief curator, California-based Lance Fung, had resigned.
“We will be exploring all opportunities for a resumption of Illuminate in the future,” the board wrote in a statement. “We look forward to building on the success of this past year’s enthusiastic support to deliver an even bigger and better show for Coral Gables and the South Florida community who so graciously backed our inaugural efforts.”
Fung’s statement was more specific, noting that he was disappointed in the cancellation, citing “recent comments by some of the City Commissioners that do not align with our values.”
The commission’s late-night debate hearkens back to Miami’s long history of making public declarations against communist regimes or questioning whether public bidders do business with Cuba or associate with people who do.
In June 1990, Nelson Mandela toured the world upon his release from 27 years as a political prisoner, and the city of Miami was set to welcome Mandela with a key to the city. They withdrew the proclamation because of Mandela’s relationship with Fidel Castro.
That attitude hasn’t faded from City Hall.
Gente de Zona, the popular Cuban reggaeton duo now famous for their hit protest song “Patria y Vida,” were excluded from the annual New Year’s Eve concert in Bayfront Park only two years ago because of their history with the regime.
“We have seen how Raúl Castro’s favorite grandson danced on stage at their concert and how they asked the audience to publicly recognize Miguel Díaz-Canel as president,” Miami Mayor Francis Suarez told el Nuevo Herald at the time.
Earlier that year Suarez pushed to cancel a concert in Allapattah by Haila María Mompié, a Cuban artist who sang to Fidel Castro about a decade ago.
‘Bigger, brighter’
The Gables commission’s vote on Tuesday was to approve $300,000 in funding for the show from the city’s art acquisition fund, a decision that was unanimously recommended by the city’s Arts Advisory Panel and Cultural Development Board.
Last year’s show, which incorporated video projections, sculptures and other pieces of art, premiered around downtown Coral Gables in February 2021 and lasted one month.
The 2022 show was scheduled to begin January 14.
Guo-Qiang’s “Fireflies” transformed pedicabs into art, aglow with 1,000 Chinese lanterns made in the artist’s home village of Quanzhou, China. The pedicabs were driven by volunteers, but the 2022 show planned to offer rides to the public.
Last year Ramos displayed her “90 Miles: De-construction, 2021” at the Hotel Colonnade on Aragon Avenue, which showed 12 light boxes in the shape of a symbolic bridge meant to represent the journey between Havana and Miami. Ramos was born in Havana.
At the commission meeting, Illuminate Coral Gables co-founder Patrick O’Connell promised commissioners that the 2022 show was expected to shine “bigger, brighter and for a longer period of time.”
He said that public funds would be used to pay for the soft costs of putting on the show, not so much the specific artists or the fabrication of the work, which will be funded by other community partners and sponsors.
O’Connell asked the commission to view any comments from the artists with a contextual lens, using George Merrick’s racist comments from the 1930s as an example. The long-ago comments, including a proposal to relocate Black community members to the “least preferred locations outside of the Miami city limits,” prompted the University of Miami to rename its parking structure earlier this year.
“The gentleman behind you has come under scrutiny for comments he made years ago, that were taken out of context,“ O’Connell said, pointing to the large painting of the city’s founder behind the dais in city hall.
“I think it’s a shame that you would knock George Merrick to make a point about the artist,” Lago said in response.
Cuba protests and Miami politics
The Illuminate decision comes during an uprising in Cuba, where over 100 people are believed to be missing, internet access has been widely shut down and videos have surfaced showing police using violence against protesters who are speaking out against the island’s communist regime.
Lago, who is Cuban-American, said that while he is an art collector who travels the world for art shows, his taste for many kinds of art stops with any ties to communist regimes.
“As the son of immigrants who came to this country with nothing, who fled Cuba, the Castro regime, socialism, communism, a dictatorship, tyranny … I am not confused by someone who sympathizes with a communist government and calls it successful,” he said.
“The art world brings an opportunity to this community for dialogue. Where my dialogue ends is people who sympathize with oppression, tyranny.”
In a statement to the Miami Herald, Lago said the commissioners are “fiduciaries on behalf of Coral Gables residents” and therefore must be “very thoughtful” on how taxpayer funds are spent.
“Illuminate is a great partner of Coral Gables and we look forward to any opportunities for a partnership in the future. Our commitment to Illuminate Coral Gables was evident when we increased the budget for this event from 100k to 300k to ensure that it was properly budgeted for, even after coming out of a pandemic,” he wrote in a statement. “We recognize how important this event is to the downtown business district and community and we look forward to having a conversation on how we can build upon our past success with Illuminate.“
This story was originally published July 15, 2021 at 4:01 PM.