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An installation by the Afro-Cuban artist María Magdalena Campos Pons has become part of the permanent collection of the newly inaugurated Centro Presidencial Obama in Chicago, making it one of the most notable commissions of the museum that opened its doors to the public this Friday.
According to a report by journalist Wilfredo Cancio Isla, the piece is titled Aún conservando el aroma de las flores —in English, Still Holding the Scent of Flowers— and was commissioned by the Obama Foundation earlier this year.
The mixed media installation is inspired by the Rose Garden of the White House and is located next to a replica of the Oval Office in the museum's exhibition halls, which opened to the public on June 19, a day after the official inauguration ceremony, Cancio notes.
Campos Pons herself, at 66 years old, defines the work as "a display of fireworks of diversity": a composition that interweaves roses, tulips, magnolias, pink and blue hyacinths, carrots, broccoli, herbs, and apple blossoms in what she describes as a meditation on the American landscape, the source indicates.
The Wendi Norris Gallery, which represents the artist, states that the reinterpretation of the Garden of Roses is manifested "in a perpetual blooming as a symbol of memory, renewal, diversity, and hope," she adds.
The piece joins the commissions made to around thirty selected American artists for the center's permanent collection, which brings together diverse voices, disciplines, and perspectives.
Louise Bernard, founding director of the Obama Presidential Center Museum, emphasized the scope of the project: "Together, these works reflect the depth and breadth of President and Mrs. Obama's commitment to public art and to artists whose practices shed light on the complexities of place, identity, and sense of belonging," reported Cancio.
Bernard added that "his contributions will anchor the Center in a vibrant artistic legacy that reflects the values championed by the president and Mrs. Obama: openness, engagement, and a deep respect for the diverse stories that shape our nation."
About the prominent artist Campos Pons, the article elaborates that she was born in Matanzas in 1959, into a family with African and Chinese ancestry. She trained at the National School of Art in Cuba and later at the Higher Institute of Art (ISA) in Havana before emigrating to the United States in 1991. In 1988, she earned a master's degree in Media Arts from the Massachusetts College of Art and Design in Boston, and since 2017, she has held the Cornelius Vanderbilt Chair in Fine Arts at Vanderbilt University in Nashville, Tennessee, where she currently resides.
Her international career includes participation in the Venice Biennale, Documenta 14, the Dakar Biennale, and exhibitions at the Museum of Modern Art (MoMA) and the Smithsonian. In December 2024, she received the ARTnews Award for Lifetime Achievement.
The Obama Presidential Center, located in the Jackson Park neighborhood on the south side of Chicago, is a complex of 7.8 acres that cost 850 million dollars and combines a museum, public library, community spaces, a basketball court, a playground, and a recording studio. The inauguration on June 18 coincided with Emancipation Day (Juneteenth), a date of profound significance for the African American community, and brought together former presidents Biden, Bush, and Clinton alongside their wives and former first ladies, as well as artists like Stevie Wonder, Bruce Springsteen, Jennifer Hudson, and Bono.
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