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The Little Haiti Cultural Center in Miami has opened the season of meetings entitled TALKS.
TALKSa re meetings organized by the partnership of two of the most venerable non-profit cultural institutions in the city of Miami: the Locust Project and the South Florida ArtCenter, which have come together in a leadership.
For each of the scheduled meetings (there are four in the lineup for the moment) some of the most influential curators of contemporary art in the United States of America speak about their experience and their vision of art, creativity, artists and how the latter are supported in their work, both in museums and in unconventional spaces because the meaning of these non-profit organizations lies in the ability to reward people who use non-traditional methods and unexpected approaches to be able to give voice to the art a wide range of experiences. A recent example of this was the site-specific 20/20 exhibition organized by the Locust Project.
Speaker of the first meeting was Deana Haggag, President and CEO of the artists of the United States of America.
Raised in Brooklyn, in a large family of Egyptian immigrants, Deana Haggag says: “I’m not an artist, I’ve never been, but I understand who I am through the arts, as a curator and as a person”. Notwithstanding the young age and the not indifferent chatty, it is not surprising that the Haggag is in charge, from February 2017, of the national scholarship program, which offers 50.000 USD in scholarships to artists working in architecture and design, craftsmanship, dance , literature, media, music, theater and entertainment, traditional arts and visual arts.
Tenacious, at the age of 26, she became executive director and “sole employee” of The Contemporary Museum, which she relaunched after its closure for about 18 months, making it one of the most vital cultural institutions of Baltimore. During his tenure, museum staff increased significantly and his budget went from $ 40,000 to over $ 500,000.
Also under her guidance, the museum commissioned four large-scale art projects, including Bubble Over Green by Victoria Fu, Ghost Food by Miriam Simun, Only When It’s Dark Enough Can You See The Stars by Abigail DeVille and The Ground by Michael Jones McKean. The museum has also made available a number of resources to strengthen the cultural community in the area.
The exemplary work of Haggag has not gone unnoticed and has been praised, among the various publications also by Vogue, Cultured Magazine, Artspace and Hyperallergic.
In addition to her leadership role, Deana Haggag has taught at Towson University and John Hopkins University. She is currently a board member of the Common Field, the Detroit Institute of Arts and the Maryland Institute of Arts, where she received her Masters in Fine Arts.
A highly respected curriculum, however, which aims, however, regardless of political or religious ideas, to amplify the growth of artists in America and more precisely the idea of what it means to be an artist in America. To bring out the nuances by opening the mind to look and see art in different ways, because art has the power to make people think and change the world.
