Held in conjunction with the opening of José Parlá: Cuba at The Gordon Parks Foundation Gallery.
José Parlá is the 2023 Gordon Parks Foundation Fellow in Art.
José Parlá has used the language of abstraction as he developed a style of painting to interpret the multiplicity of experiences in cities that have served as crossroads in his life, from the most distant geographies to those he identifies as home. Parlá is known for his large-scale paintings and his community engagement. Among his works are ONE: Union of the Senses in the lobby of One World Trade Center, Manhattan; Diary of Brooklyn, Barclays Center, Brooklyn; the Writer’s Library (collaboration with Snøhetta), Queens; Nature of Language, James B. Hunt Jr. Library, North Carolina State University; and Amistad América, University of Texas at Austin. Parla has had solo exhibitions at, among other venues, Bronx Museum, New York; Kennedy Center, Washington, D.C.; Neuberger Museum of Art, Harrison, New York; Pérez Art Museum Miami; SCAD Museum of Art, Savannah, Georgia; and the 2019 Istanbul Biennial. His work is in a number of leading international collections including Pérez Art Museum Miami; The British Museum, London; Buffalo AKG Art Museum; POLA Museum of Art, Hakone, Japan; The Neuberger Museum of Art, Purchase, New York; El Espacio, Miami; and The National Museum of Fine Arts, Havana, Cuba. Parlá lives and works in New York.
Ruben Toledo is a Cuban born artist, fashion critic, author and surrealist wit. Toledo's work appears in The New Yorker, Vogue, Town & Country, and The New York Times. He created Nordstrom's national advertising for a decade and illustrated the Louis Vuitton City Guide for two. His work has been exhibited in many museums worldwide including Metropolitan Museum of Art’s Costume Institute, MoMU, Antwerp, and The Victoria and Albert Museum, London. His collaboration with his late wife Isabel Toledo, was the subject of a book and museum exhibition at The Museum at the Fashion Institute of Technology in 2009 and since traveled worldwide. The Toledo Studio was awarded a Cooper Hewitt National Design Award in 2005 for their joint works in fashion. Toledo is the author of Style Dictionary and Fashion Almanac as well as illustrating numerous books including Nina Garcia's fashion book series and most recently Be-Spoke by Marylou Luther.