Through its main exhibition held over the course of a single day at La Comay (a seaside kiosk in Loíza, Puerto Rico, that preserves Afropuerto Rican tradition and culture through food), the Grand Tropical Biennial and the particular seaside setting challenge the idea of the white cube as an exhibition space and acknowledge the implications and specificities of the local context, while centering visibility onto the global south.
“Ofrenda” (Offering)
2025
Municipal latex paint from Loíza on coconut and cut fir tree
24” x 84” x 14”
This 3rd edition of the event explored a diverse set of thematic axes, including: forms of resistance within neocolonial contexts, diasporic and migratory flows of the Puerto Rican diaspora, Afro-Caribbean and Indigenous Caribbean heritage and culture, and the beach as a political space and site of economic, sociocultural and territorial struggle. Through a program including a video art screening and the main 1-day exhibition, this 3rd edition presented the work of 68 international artists selected by the curatorial team through an open call process.
Our work "Ofrenda" (Offering) was presented as part of the event's main exhibition along the coastline. Derived from our long-standing focus on the phenomenon of public painting in Puerto Rico and its link to geometric abstraction, this work embodies a dialogue between the local and foreign through two objects that stand as symbols of economic trade between the global north and south: the coconut and the fir tree.
