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(Photo by Oriol Tarridas)
Pérez Art Museum Miami (PAMM) recently announced a transformative gift of 82 works from the collection of Jorge M. Pérez to the museum’s permanent collection, to be accessioned into the collection before the end of the year.
The gift features nearly all of the works shown in Language and Image: Conceptual and Performance-Based Photography from the Jorge M. Pérez Collection, currently on view through Jan. 11, 2026. The donation includes works by 58 artists, such as Samuel Fosso, Ana Mendieta, and Candida Höfer, with an emphasis on artists from Latin America and the African diaspora.
The generous donation reflects both PAMM’s curatorial vision and Pérez’s shared commitment to the museum’s mission of supporting historically underrepresented artists through thoughtful and inclusive collecting.
The donation marks the latest chapter in Pérez’s long-term vision to ensure the museum reflects the global, multigenerational context of Miami, building on existing gifts spanning Latin American modernism, contemporary Cuban art, and artists from Africa and its diaspora. This marks Pérez’s most global gift to PAMM’s permanent collection to date, and his first dedicated to photography.
“Our partnership with PAMM has always been rooted in expanding access to art that encourages audiences to move beyond perceived cultural and creative boundaries,” Pérez said. “We are proud that this collection showcases the powerful photographic work of Latin American and African artists, offering them the recognition and thoughtful engagement their contributions deserve on a global scale. At the same time, the inclusion of significant works by European and American photographers further enriches PAMM’s photography collection as a whole.”
Pérez is widely recognized as one of the most influential real estate developers, contemporary art collectors, and cultural philanthropists in the United States. As founding executive chair of Related Group, he has transformed South Florida’s skyline for over 45 years, overseeing a real estate development portfolio exceeding $50 billion.
Passionate supporters of the arts, Pérez and his wife, Darlene, have built one of the country’s most significant contemporary art collections, highlighting international and Latin American artists, and created El Espacio 23, a contemporary art space dedicated to exhibiting works and engaging the public.
Building on this dedication, their lifetime contributions to the arts and broader community now exceed $200 million, including the naming gift for PAMM, a multimillion-dollar endowment to Tate Modern, and a $1.5 million contribution to Madrid’s Museo Reina Sofía. Their work reflects a lifelong commitment to enriching communities, advancing the arts and fostering cultural connections across continents.
“We are immensely grateful for Jorge’s extraordinary gift, which deepens PAMM’s commitment to presenting a truly global view of contemporary art, one that reflects the richness and complexity of Miami itself,” said Franklin Sirmans, Sandra and Tony Tamer director at PAMM. “This collection of conceptual and performance-based photography — which we have the pleasure of exhibiting for another few weeks — not only expands our permanent collection in profound ways, but also supports our ongoing mission to champion artists from Latin America and the African diaspora whose voices have shaped, and continue to shape, the cultural landscape. We are profoundly grateful for Jorge and Darlene Pérez’s sustained vision and generosity, which ensures that these works will inspire our audiences and scholars for generations to come.”
The collection presented in Language and Image offers a global perspective on photography’s evolution — from a documentary tool to a medium for cultural expression, activism, and conceptual exploration. It focuses on abstract, documentary, and performance works, playing on the unspoken language delivered from a photographic image, demonstrating the notion that with the ability to capture time and memories, photography has the power to construct a unique truth and reality.
Highlights include works by: Marina Abramovic, Vito Acconci, John Baldessari, Kwame Brathwaite, María Magdalena Campos-Pons, Olafur Eliasson, Samuel Fosso, Candida Höfer, Rashid Johnson, Isaac Julien, Joseph Kosuth, Teresa Margolles, Ana Mendieta, Vik Muniz, Oscar Muñoz, Shirin Neshat, Gabriel Orozco, Damián Ortega, Gordon Parks, Liliana Porter, Thomas Ruff, Cindy Sherman, Thomas Struth, and Wolfgang Tillmans.
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