The
Museo de Arte Contemporáneo de Puerto Rico (MAC) is dedicated to collecting and exhibiting contemporary art from Puerto Rican, Caribbean, Latinx, and Latin American perspectives. Over the next three years, Curator Marina Reyes Franco, Associate Curator Abdiel D. Segarra Ríos, and Curatorial Research Assistant Alexandra T. Méndez García will organize a series of exhibitions that deepen MAC’s focus on diasporic abstraction, environmental histories, and overlooked legacies of political and conceptual art. Their curatorial approach is rooted in a sustained inquiry into the cultural forces that shape contemporary life in Puerto Rico and the region.
Arnaldo Roche Rabell, Isla vacía, 1987. Oil on canvas. Collection Museo de Arte Contemporáneo de Puerto Rico (MAC), gift of Francis and Maud Duquella. Courtesy MAC, Puerto Rico
In September 2025,
Trópico Agridulce (Bittersweet Tropics), a collection-based group exhibition, will explore the politics of food in the Caribbean, bringing together works that address agriculture, trade, and ancestral knowledge. The project builds on themes from MAC’s 2021 show
El momento del yagrumo (The Moment of the Yagrumo) and expands the museum’s engagement with environmental histories.
In early 2026,
Diasporican Abstraction: Identity Beyond Representation aims to expand the canon of Puerto Rican abstract painting and will feature the work of twenty artists of Puerto Rican origin, primarily based in Puerto Rico and the US, with others in Canada, Europe, and Australia. In fall 2026,
Descifrando a Antonio Navia (Deciphering Antonio Navia) will reintroduce the work of Puerto Rican sculptor and printmaker Antonio Navia.
Lope Max Díaz, Colisión, 1977. Acrylic on canvas with wood and rope. Collection Museo de Arte Contemporáneo de Puerto Rico (MAC). Courtesy MAC, Puerto Rico. Photo: Antonio Ramírez Aponte
In 2027,
Marcos Irizarry: Primeras abstracciones (1965–1972) (Marcos Irizarry: First Abstractions [1965–1972]), guest-curated by Emilia Quiñones Otal, will present lesser-known and previously unexhibited works by painter and printmaker Marcos Irizarry (1936–1995) in which boundaries of Spain, Puerto Rico, and Latin America blur. The focus on overlooked art histories and conceptual art culminates in a 2027–28 exhibition and international convening focused on M&M Proyectos, the influential early 2000s curatorial platform founded by Michy Marxuach, and will feature works by Jesús “Bubu” Negrón and Chemi Rosado Seijo, new commissions, and a bilingual publication drawing from newly donated archival materials to examine M&M’s role in shaping conceptual art in the Caribbean.
Chemi Rosado Seijo, El renacimiento del cubo plano, 2001. Fabric and polyurethane foam. Collection Museo de Arte Contemporáneo de Puerto Rico (MAC), gift of Otero-Casiano Family. Courtesy MAC, Puerto Rico. Photo: Antonio Ramírez Aponte
Marina Reyes Franco is Curator at the Museo de Arte Contemporáneo de Puerto Rico (MAC). Her research and curatorial practice focus on the impact of tourism on Caribbean cultural production. At MAC, Franco has led the commissioning of several works both on-site and off-site and has contributed to the acquisition of archives and artworks by Caribbean, diasporic, and Afro-descendant artists. She has curated recent exhibitions at MAC such as Sunlight on the Sea Floor (with Paula Naughton, 2024); Puerto Rico Negrx (with María Elena Ortiz, 2023); and Tropical is Political: Caribbean Art Under the Visitor Economy Regime (Americas Society, New York, 2022; MAC, 2023; Mead Art Museum at Amherst College, Amherst, 2024). With Gala Berger, she co-founded La Ene (Buenos Aires), which she directed from 2010 to 2014. Her essays, articles, and reviews have been published by numerous international institutions and journals. She earned a BA in Art History from the University of Puerto Rico and an MA in Argentine and Latin American Art History from IDAES-UNSAM.
Abdiel D. Segarra Ríos serves as Associate Curator at the MAC. He has organized exhibitions at institutions such as MAC, Centro Cultural de España en Tegucigalpa (Honduras), Ten North Group (Miami), El Lobi (San Juan), and Ana Mas Project (Barcelona). Previously, Segarra Ríos was co-researcher for Espacio Afro’s (Madrid) project Cartography: Cultures and Ethno-Racial Diversity and served as Director of the Visual Arts Program and the San Juan Poly/Graphic Triennial at the Instituto de Cultura Puertorriqueña (San Juan). He is a recipient of the Lexus Grant for Artists and the Award for Excellence in Contemporary Arts Management, and his writing has also been published in the Latin American Visual Studies Network. Segarra Ríos earned an MA in Contemporary Art History and Visual Culture and is currently a PhD candidate in Artistic, Literary, and Cultural Studies at the Universidad Autónoma de Madrid, Spain. He also holds an MA in Cultural Management and Administration from the Universidad de Puerto Rico, Río Piedras, and a BFA in Painting and Printmaking from the Escuela de Artes Plásticas y Diseño de Puerto Rico.
Alexandra T. Méndez García is Curatorial Assistant at the MAC. She recently contributed to the exhibitions Puerto Rico Negrx (2023) and 10 años de MAC en el Barrio (10 Years of MAC in the Neighborhood, 2024), a retrospective of the commissions and projects that have resulted from the museum's cultural equity program. Méndez García previously served as Coordinator of Academic Access at the Colby College Museum of Art (Waterville, ME), where she was an interlocutor for the exhibition Imagining an Archipelago (forthcoming, 2026). Centering ecological readings of contemporary Caribbean art, she has written for publications such as Momus, Intervenxions, U.S. LatinX Art Forum, and Revista Plástica. She has also contributed studio writing for artists including Alia Farid and Gamaliel Rodríguez, and texts for galleries such as Negrón Pizarro and Souvenir 154 (San Juan). Méndez García holds an MA in Art History from the University of Texas at Austin.