Mas family pledges $5 million toward FIU center that will honor Cuban culture
If you visit the greater Miami area, you can enjoy tastes of Cuban culture nearly anywhere — whether sharing a colada with friends at a downtown ventanita, dancing to a Celia Cruz tune at a South Beach bar or watching the domino players in Little Havana on a Sunday afternoon.
Now, Florida International University plans to gather these emblematic experiences of the Cuban heritage and showcase them in a new building to house its Cuban cultural center, CasaCuba, inaugurated in 2018.
To finance the more than $34 million project, FIU has knocked on the doors of many, including Bacardi and the National Endowment for the Humanities. This week, the Mas family joined the philanthropic patrons.
Jorge Mas, one of the center’s founders, announced Wednesday he would donate $5 million toward the construction of the 57,000-square-foot facility on the Modesto A. Maidique Campus at FIU, its main campus at 11200 SW Eighth St.
Co-founder of the engineering and construction company MasTec, chairman of the Cuban American National Foundation and managing owner of Inter Miami CF, Miami’s Major League Soccer team, Mas told the Herald he hopes CasaCuba will teach the rest of the world about Cubans’ history, including heartaches after Fidel Castro came to power in 1959.
“We lack that in our community,” he said Wednesday, “a place that will, for, beyond our lifetime, continue to live and show the greatness of the Cuban culture and the Cuban people even through very tragic and difficult times like the dictatorship, which has now gone on for 60 years and counting.”
CasaCuba will house classrooms, event space
Mas said he views his gift not only as way to give back, but also as a way to pay tribute to the generations of Cubans, including his late father, Jorge Mas Canosa, who left the island looking for a better future and passed away before witnessing a free Cuba.
“We’re very blessed to be in a position to make a contribution of this magnitude,” he said.
FIU will name a wing in CasaCuba after the Mas family.
Although the design of CasaCuba by René González Architects won’t be unveiled for a few more months, María Carla Chicuén, CasaCuba’s executive director and a Cuban immigrant herself, said the team already has a rough idea of what it will look like.
Throughout multiple floors, the building will house classrooms and office areas for the Cuban Research Institute, FIU’s think tank on Cuba affairs. It will host galleries to display art, photography and other exhibitions.
There will be venues for personal events like weddings and birthday parties, and professional ones like academic lectures and theater performances.
“It’s a very dynamic facility that will have constant activities for everyone — from the children to the elderly, from policymakers and business leaders, executive round tables and forums, to students and the community at large, where you can come to learn and to be inspired by the Cuban story,” Chicuén said.
The center will also include animated screens and other technology features, allowing visitors to virtually navigate Cuban neighborhoods, and hear or record their own experiences.
Chicuén said she hopes FIU will break ground in the coming year.
“Jorge and his family have been longtime supporters of the project,” she said. “We’re really inspired that he has chosen to give such meaningful support towards the capital campaign.”
This story was originally published May 19, 2021 at 7:17 PM.
