Collection: Jose Bedia

Few Cuban artists have developed a body of work as coherent and original as that of José Bedia. Although he is one of the most outstanding examples in the history of art in Cuba and Latin America, and he has also received international acknowledgement, his true importance has not yet been fully recognized. In his paintings, drawings and installations, José Bedia has not only used a hive of cultural references from Cuba, but also from Latin America, the Caribbean and Africa, focusing on those that western civilization, with its technological vanity and false idea of progress, has considered underdeveloped, backward or pre-modern. According to Bedia, his work is an attempt to rescue, through the discursive strategies of contemporary art, the dispersed fragments of that old wisdom which, to a greater or lesser extent, all those societies have in common, and which are of great importance to complete the deficits of our unbalanced contemporaneity. Bedia's creative method, seemingly spontaneous, intuitive and at times naive, is not only the product of previous rigorous study, but of the assimilation of formal, material, aesthetic, symbolic and historical elements from those cultures that have inspired him and that he reflects either in a simple drawing or painting or in one of his monumental installations. The often simple and schematic appearance of his works and the generally austere and synthetic character of his discourse follows the principle of doing more with less, concealing a conceptual and philosophical depth and an abundance of uncommon information, the result not so much of bookish study as of his contact and direct identification with the systems of knowledge of those cultural groups that some call native, aboriginal or traditional.

From Art Palm Beach, in 2018. The extraordinary artistic legacy of Jose Bedia goes beyond the contributions of the Cuban and Latin American modernist vanguard, of crossing and merging movements and styles between the western and peripheral artistic experiences. Bedia’s contemporaneity incorporates a multitude of cultural influences, each enclosing upon the other in multiple developments of power, loss, and production. Bedia is not only a Miami artist. While he is an American of Cuban origin, he is universal in his symbolism, as his works address the complex processes of human exchange and the linguistic, economic, racial, gendered, religious and cultural factors involved in these exchanges. At this year’s ArtPalmBeach, Bedia will be honored as the 2018 Visionary Award Winner, and will be presenting a one-man show exhibiting an entirely new collection of works that are sure to inspire.

In every detail of his artworks, Bedia masters his spiritual exploration and rich cultural heritage. His contemplation of spiritual beliefs and his personal relationship with the Santería faith are apparent in his body of work, which includes large-scale figurative paintings, installations, and drawings. His works highlight the layering of sacred, social, and historical constructs and are celebrated all over the world. His mastery and universal narrative have made his works standouts in significant private and public collections seen by millions today. His works can be found in the halls of these museums:

Whitney Museum of American Art, New York

NY Guggenheim Museum, New York

Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York

Museum of Modern Art, New York, NY

Loeb Art Center, Vassar College, Poughkeepsie, NY

Arkansas Arts Center, Little Rock, AR

Birmingham Museum of Art, Birmingham, AL

Contemporary Art Museum, San Diego, CA

MOCA, Long Beach, CA

Cantor Arts Center, Stanford University, CA

Honolulu Museum of Art, Honolulu, HI

Perseus Collection, Honolulu, HI

Fogg Art Museum, Harvard University, Cambridge, MA

Fort Lauderdale Museum of Art, Fort Lauderdale, FL

Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, Washington, DC

Smithsonian Museum, Washington, DC

Spencer Museum, Lawrence, KS

McCormick Place Art Collection, Chicago, IL

Miami Art Museum, Miami, FL

MOCA, Miami, Florida

PAMM, Miami, Florida

Kendall Art Center, Miami, Florida

NSU Art Center, Ft. Lauderdale, Florida

Norton Museum of Art, West Palm Beach, FL

Polk Museum of Art, Ft. Lauderdale, FL

Bacardi Art Foundation, Miami, FL

Philadelphia Museum of Art, Philadelphia, PA

Phoenix Art Museum, Phoenix, AZ

Museum of Art, Rhode Island School of Design, Providence, RI

Walter Phillips Gallery, Bath, Canada

Ludwig Collection, Aachen, Germany

Pori Taidmuseum, Finland

Tate Museum, London, UK

The Collection Daros, Zurich, Switzerland

Museo de Arte Contemporáneo, Monterrey , Mexico

Liceo Minvielle, Lagos

Mexico Centro Cultural/Arte Contemporáneo, Mexico City, Mexico

Extremadura and Ibero-American Museum of Contemporary Art of Badajoz, Spain MEIAC, Spain

DA2, Spain

IVAM, Spain

CAAM, Spain

Museo de Bellas Artes, Caracas, Venezuela

Museo de Bellas Artes, Havana, Cuba

Centro Wifredo Lam, Havana, Cuba

This gallery represents four contemporary artists, who we feel have significant investment potential, who's work can be considered "blue chip", who have the CV's and museum presence to back that up, and who this gallery considers to have both conceptual genius, and technical mastery. Think about this for a moment. How many contemporary artists can you say this about? These artists are Jose Bedia, Baruj Salinas, Francisco Toledo (his body of work can be seen on our Artnet site), and Ramon Alejandro.

Raul Enmanuel has those qualities too, but without the major museum presence, therefore we cannot make a statement about his investment potential. 

MLA Gallery offers exceptional customer service and enjoys an outstanding reputation (please see our feedback on Google, Yelp, or Facebook). We have been around for 20 years, with a brick and mortar gallery near downtown Los Angeles. We always guarantee your satisfaction with the any work in the gallery, or your money back.