The Juan Carlos Maldonado Collection Announces a New Chapter Focused on Institutional Collaboration, Research, and Global Engagement
Photo: Juan Carlos Maldonado by Íñigo de Amescua for El Español, 2024
MIAMI, FL — July 20th, 2026 — The Juan Carlos Maldonado Collection (JCMC) is pleased to announce a new chapter in its evolution, transitioning from a venue-based model to one focused on institutional collaborations, research initiatives, and expanded digital access. This strategic shift will allow the Collection to engage broader audiences, deepen its contribution to cultural exchange and knowledge, and activate its holdings through collaboration with leading cultural organizations around the world.
As part of this transition, JCMC has concluded operations at its exhibition space in the Miami Design District, marking the completion of a remarkable ten-year chapter that established the Collection as a vibrant cultural destination within South Florida’s arts ecosystem.
“This is not an ending, but an evolution,” said Juan Carlos Maldonado, Founder and President of the Juan Carlos Maldonado Collection. “Over the past decade, our space in Miami allowed us to share extraordinary works of art, foster meaningful conversations, and build a community around collecting, scholarship, and cultural exchange. We are immensely proud of what was accomplished there. Today, we look ahead to new ways of fulfilling our mission by collaborating with institutions, expanding access to the collection, and creating opportunities for research, learning, and public engagement that reach audiences far beyond our walls.”
Celebrating Ten Years in Miami
Since opening its doors in the Miami Design District, JCMC has served as a platform for exhibitions, educational initiatives, public programs, and community engagement. For ten years, JCMC maintained a free and publicly accessible exhibition space, welcoming visitors from around the world and creating opportunities for audiences of all backgrounds to engage directly with works from the Collection. Through collaborations with artists, curators, scholars, collectors, and cultural organizations, the Collection helped enrich Miami’s cultural landscape while contributing to the growing recognition of Latin American, Indigenous, and international modern and contemporary art. This commitment deepened in 2018, when JCMC expanded its holdings to include an important collection of Ye’kwana artifacts and basketry. It broadened further in 2024 with the acquisition of Pre-Columbian ceramics and textiles from the Nazca (Early, Intermediate, and Late Periods, c. 100 BCE–700 CE), Tiwanaku (c. 400–1000 CE), Wari (Middle Horizon, c. 600–1000 CE), and Inca civilizations. These acquisitions expanded the Collection’s scope to encompass the study of Indigenous art, knowledge systems, and material culture from Latin America alongside its longstanding focus on geometric abstraction.
Over the last decade, the space welcomed thousands of visitors and hosted a diverse range of exhibitions, lectures, conversations, screenings, performances, and special events that encouraged dialogue, learning, and discovery. Beyond presenting works from the Collection, JCMC became a gathering place for artists, students, academics, collectors, and members of the broader community, fostering connections across disciplines, generations, and geographies. The Collection actively cultivated exchange with universities and cultural organizations, hosting visits and public programs for students and faculty from local and international institutions, including Florida International University (FIU) and Istituto Marangoni in Miami, the National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM), among others. Curator-led talks, artist interviews, and program recordings have been made freely available online through JCMC’s digital platforms, extending the Collection’s educational reach to audiences worldwide.
During its ten years in the Miami Design District, JCMC organized more than thirteen exhibitions that explored the intersections of geometric abstraction, Indigenous knowledge systems, and contemporary artistic practice. Highlights included Constructing Constructivism (2017–2018), The Ye’kwana Universe: Living in the Middle of the Jungle (2022–2023), Secret Affinities / Aesthetics of Two Worlds (2024–2025), Convergencias / Divergencias: Dos Estéticas, Una Sensibilidad (2025), and Urban Forms (2025–2026), among others. These exhibitions introduced audiences to new perspectives on the histories and futures of abstraction while fostering dialogue between artists, scholars, and the public.
The Collection’s impact extended far beyond its own walls through traveling exhibitions and significant loans to leading international institutions. Convergencias / Divergencias. Dos estéticas en diálogo, curated by Ariel Jiménez, traveled to Casa de América in Madrid (December 2024 – March 2025), where it was included in the official program of the ARCOmadrid 2025 fair and accompanied by a curator symposium and the public launch of Ye’kwana Basketry Symbology: Portal to a Parallel World (2019), a landmark study of Ye’kwana cosmology and craftsmanship. The exhibition subsequently traveled to the Museo de Arte Contemporáneo de Monterrey (MARCO) in Mexico (2025). Works from the Collection have also been included as loans in major exhibitions at leading institutions, among them Gego: Measuring Infinity at the Solomon R. Guggenheim Museum in New York; Antes de América. Fuentes originarias en la cultura moderna at the Fundación Juan March in Madrid; Hélio Oiticica: To Organize Delirium at the Whitney Museum of American Art; and Carmen Herrera: Lines of Sight at both the Whitney Museum of American Art and the Kunstsammlung Nordrhein-Westfalen in Düsseldorf. Publications from the Collection have also been made available at international institutions, including the Pérez Art Museum Miami (PAMM), the Institute of Contemporary Art, Miami (ICA), Americas Society in New York, and Sala Mendoza in Caracas, among others. Since 2016, the Collection has maintained a long-term loan of Jesús Rafael Soto’s Penetrable BBL Bleu to the Pérez Art Museum Miami (PAMM), ensuring continued public access to one of the landmark works of Latin American kinetic art.
Equally important has been JCMC’s commitment to publishing and research. Over the past decade, the Collection has supported more than sixteen publications, including exhibition catalogues and investigation projects that have contributed to the study of modern, contemporary, and Indigenous art and anthropology. Notable examples include the catalogues accompanying Urban Forms (2025–2026), The Juan Carlos Maldonado Collection in Time: The Rigor of Geometric Shapes (2023-2024) and The Ye’kwana Universe (2022–2023), as well as Convergencias / Divergencias: Dos Estéticas, Una Sensibilidad (2025), and Ye’kwana Basketry Symbology: Portal to a Parallel World. These publications have helped extend the reach of the Collection’s exhibitions and made new scholarship accessible to academics, students, and the broader public.
The Collection also became an active participant in major cultural calendars, contributing to Miami Art Week and Art Basel Miami Beach in South Florida, and engaging internationally through the ARCOmadrid fair program in Madrid. The Collection’s program helped build meaningful relationships with local audiences, international visitors, and key institutions within South Florida’s arts community, including the Pérez Art Museum Miami (PAMM) and the Institute of Contemporary Art, Miami (ICA). Its presence in the Miami Design District helped position the neighborhood as a destination not only for design and commerce, but also for cultural discovery and intellectual exchange.
In recognition of its contributions to the promotion and study of art through collecting, exhibitions, publications, and public programming, JCMC was awarded the Fundación ARCO “A” Award for International Collecting in 2025, one of the leading international distinctions recognizing excellence in private collecting and cultural stewardship.
The Collection is deeply grateful to the artists, curators, institutions, partners, supporters, and visitors who contributed to this vibrant chapter and helped shape its impact. Their participation transformed the space into a platform for exploration and made possible a decade of meaningful engagement with the public.
Looking Ahead
As it enters this new chapter, the Juan Carlos Maldonado Collection will build on its longstanding commitment to artistic excellence, cultural stewardship, and public engagement through a model centered on partnerships with leading institutions and organizations worldwide.
Rather than focusing resources on a permanent exhibition space, JCMC will direct its efforts toward initiatives that extend the Collection’s reach and impact through collaborations with museums, universities, and cultural organizations worldwide. Future projects will include traveling exhibitions and loans, publications, academic study, educational programs, and curatorial initiatives that advance the understanding and appreciation of the artists, ideas, and cultural histories represented in the Collection’s holdings across modern, contemporary, and Indigenous art.
At the center of this evolution is an expanded digital platform that will serve as the primary gateway to the Collection’s artworks, publications, and ongoing programming, providing broader access to its resources and fostering new opportunities for learning, scholarship, and cultural exchange. Through this model, JCMC reaffirms its commitment to sharing art, knowledge, and ideas with audiences internationally while supporting new partnerships and initiatives for years to come.
About the Juan Carlos Maldonado Collection
Founded by collector Juan Carlos Maldonado in 2005, the Juan Carlos Maldonado Collection is recognized for its commitment to geometric abstraction as a universal language, with holdings spanning modern, contemporary, and Indigenous art and material culture from Latin America and around the world, including an important collection of ye’kwana artifacts and basketry, and pre-Columbian ceramics and textiles. Over two decades, the Collection has assembled important works by pioneering artists whose practices have shaped the development of abstraction and contemporary artistic discourse.
Through collecting, research, exhibitions, publications, and collaborative initiatives, JCMC seeks to preserve cultural heritage, advance knowledge, and foster greater public understanding of the transformative role of art in society.
Media Contact
Juan Carlos Maldonado Collection Press info@jcmc.art
High-resolution images available upon request.
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