The exhibition will be on view at the Mennello Museum from June 7 through September 8, 2019, with an Opening Reception on June 7. This exhibition will explore Firelei Báez’s investigations on the visibility and the construction of complex cultural identities within the Afro-Caribbean Diaspora and how these notions are perceived in today’s global world. Her large-scale and intricate portraits of influential individuals and mythical goddesses of Afro-Caribbean history create a contemporary narrative of a woman’s life, embracing the past, and staking her place in a universal future. This exhibition will also feature a new installation by the artist to consider the scarring of colonization and time on the landscape, in striking neon and opulent color. Her goal is to immerse the viewer in a space of melted time, to consider themes of interweaving geography and individuality. Báez is best known through her extraordinary paintings of lush landscaped-figures, intricately patterned tignons, and otherworldly bodies with striking eyes. Here, she considers the reality of ones current social and the historic construction of cultural self in America. These complex, intersectional bodies and symbols alongside large-scale portraits are painted in vibrant, swirling colors, which intermingle time and character. For Báez, “identity is malleable, negotiated,” and given strength by the female body and mythology of her being.