# Invocations of the Diaspora: A Conversation on the Art of Belonging ![Flyer of the event](/sites/g/files/omnuum12451/files/styles/hwp_5_4__480x385/public/2025-09/12O2A4117.jpg?itok=w95Zx1Dn) #### calendar\_today Date and Time **September 25, 2025** 05:00PM - 07:15PM EDT #### pin\_drop Location **Room 422, History of Art and Architecture Department** [ 485 Broadway Cambridge, MA 02138 United States ]() Two decades ago, migration and diaspora were central topics in critical discourse. Today, there is renewed urgency to revisit and reimagine the diaspora as a defining experience of our times. *Invocations of the Diaspora: A Conversation on the Art of Belonging* approaches the diaspora not merely as a condition of exile or distance, but as a generative lens through which to rethink identity, memory, aesthetics, space, and belonging. This program is presented alongside *Three Variations of a Diasporic Landscape*, on view at DRCLAS until March 2026. The exhibition traces longing and belonging across personal and historical terrains, exploring the cultural and political significance of the Latin American diaspora. Featuring artists Sandra Gamarra, Naomi Gamarra, and Sarah Zapata, the exhibition constructs an intimate geography of displacement—where nostalgia becomes a tool for creative reconstruction, and the absence of homeland inspires new visual and emotional landscapes. Exhibition artist Sandra Gamarra, visual artists Tania Bruguera and Rubén Ortiz-Torres, curator Evan Garza, scholar Nelson Maldonado-Torres, and Harvard professor Doris Sommer will further explore the exhibition’s themes of liminality and in-betweenness. *Invocations of the Diaspora* asks why Latin America continues to exclude its diaspora from regional imaginaries, even as diasporic communities reshape its image abroad. At a time when nationalism threatens pluralism across the hemisphere, the experiences of the diaspora—their aesthetic strategies, political insights, and emotional architectures—offer an essential framework for understanding Latin America not as a fixed place, but as a dynamic network of contested and evolving affiliations. **Speakers:** - **Nelson Maldonado Torres,** Professor of Philosophy, UConn. Expert on modernity/coloniality, decoloniality, and liberation ethics. - **Tania Bruguera,** Visual Artist and Senior Lecturer, Harvard University. Founder of Latin America’s first performance studies program, exploring art and political life. - **Sandra Gamarra,** Visual Artist. Known for Pinacoteca Migrante, representing Spain in the 60th Venice Biennale, with works in MoMA and Tate Museum. - **Evan Garza,** Curator, MASS MoCA. Contemporary art scholar and curator, former Artistic Director of the 2021 Texas Biennial. - **Doris Sommer,** Professor of Romance Languages, Harvard University. Founder of Cultural Agents, promoting civic engagement through the arts - **Rubén Ortiz-Torres,** Visual Artist and Professor, UC San Diego. Works across photography, video, painting, and installations; leading figure in Mexican postmodernism. **Moderators:** - **Thomas Cummins,** Director of Dumbarton Oaks, Harvard University - **Patricio del Real,** Associate Professor of History of Art and Architecture, Harvard University - **Jose Falconi**, Assistant Professor of Art and Human Rights, University of Connecticut ##### About the speakers **Nelson Maldonado-Torres**, Professor of Philosophy at UConn, is Co-Chair of the Frantz Fanon Foundation and President Emeritus of the Caribbean Philosophical Association. He is also Professor Extraordinarious at the University of South Africa and Honorary Professor at the University of KwaZulu Natal. His research spans decolonial theory, Africana philosophy, Caribbean, Latin American and Latinx philosophy, philosophy of race, religion, psychology, and liberation ethics. **Rubén Ortiz-Torres**, Visual Artist and Professor at UC San Diego, began his career in the 1980s as a photographer, printmaker, and painter. He is recognized as a leading Mexican artist and a pioneer of postmodernism in Mexico. Over the past decade, Ortiz-Torres has produced works in photography, readymades, film, video, large-scale installations, paintings, sculptures, customized machines, and curated exhibitions. His work has been featured in over 25 solo exhibitions, 100+ group shows, and 50+ screenings internationally. **Sandra Gamarra Heshiki** (Lima, 1972; lives and works in Madrid) is among the most prominent Latin American artists working in Europe. She represented Spain at the 60th Venice Biennale (2024) with her renowned *Pinacoteca Migrante*, a series of re-appropriated and intervened paintings from Spanish Colonial collections that expose colonial biases. Her work is held in the Museum of Modern Art, New York; the Tate, London; and the Museo Reina Sofia, Madrid, among others. **Evan Garza**, Curator at MASS MoCA, is a scholar of global contemporary art. A Fulbright Scholar at the Irish Museum of Modern Art (2021–2022) and Visiting Research Fellow at Trinity College Dublin, Garza has also served as Artistic Director of the Texas Biennial and Director of Rice Public Art. They hold an M.A. in Art History from the Williams Graduate Program at the Clark Art Institute. **Tania Bruguera**, Visual Artist and Senior Lecturer at Harvard University, explores how art can engage everyday political life, transforming social affect into political action. Her projects intervene in institutional structures of memory, education, and politics. Bruguera holds an MFA in Performance from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and founded Cátedra Arte de Conducta, the first performance studies program in Latin America. Her work is part of permanent collections worldwide, including the Bronx Museum of the Arts, Museo Nacional de Bellas Artes de La Habana, and MoMA, New York. **Doris Sommer**, Professor of Romance Languages at Harvard University, is founder of *Cultural Agents*, an initiative to revive the civic mission of the humanities. She promotes development through arts and humanities globally, including the “Arts and Policy Certificate” for city governments and *Pre-Texts*, a program supporting democracy through literacy, critical thinking, and creativity. See also:- [ Three Variations of a Diasporic Landscape ](/programs-initiatives/three-variations-diasporic-landscape) Share on:- [ Facebook ](#) - [ Twitter ](#) - [ Linkedin ](#) Save: [ Add to calendar calendar\_today ](https://www.drclas.harvard.edu/node/1588826/event-feed.ics) Copy link link