MIAMI, FLA.- Just six months since taking the helm at Pérez Art Museum Miami, Director Franklin Sirmans announces a number of significant new acquisitions for the museum’s permanent collection, including: 100 works from PAMM trustee Craig Robins; a film installation by Stan Douglas, purchased in partnership with LACMA, which will go on view at PAMM on May 26, 2016; monumental sculptures by Ernesto Neto and Pablo Atchugarry, from Jorge M. Pérez, which will be installed in the museum’s sculpture garden this month; a suite of 14 prints by Mark Bradford, the U.S. representative at this year’s Venice Biennale; an iconic installation by Hew Locke; and several works from PAMM exhibitions that will now have a permanent home in Miami, among others.

“With PAMM successfully opened, on time and on budget, Franklin was brought on to guide the museum through its next phase of growth and development, and a major part of that is collection building,” said Aaron Podhurst, chairman of PAMM’s board of trustees. “In just six months, Franklin has already proven his effectiveness by bringing in incredible works of art that represent the unique diversity of our community.”

Notable works include

New works purchased by the PAMM Collectors Council:

• Carmen Herrera, Alba, 2014, purchased by the PAMM Collectors Council, an example of the Cuban-born, New York-based artist’s most recent body of work in a lifelong conversation on color and form

• Taryn Simon, Convention on Cluster Munitions, Oslo, Norway, December 3, 2008, 2015

• John Akomfrah, Tropikos, 2016

• Stan Douglas, Luanda-Kinshasa (2014), a joint purchase by PAMM and LACMA collectors councils. The film, on view at PAMM May 27 until September 25, 2016, is set in New York in the 1970s and explores the African origins of music at that time, thus drawing on multiple aspects of “the Atlantic rim”--a geographic region that sweeps from New York to west Africa that the museum is committed to focusing on in its collection. Making a joint acquisition with LACMA highlighted PAMM's growing dialogue with other major American museums.

• A donation of 100 works of art was made by Craig Robins, a member of PAMM’s board of trustees since 2002 and chair of the PAMM Collectors Council since October 2014. Robins’ gift includes works by notable contemporary artists including Jedediah Caesar, Patty Chang, Aïda Ruilova and Rachel Lachowicz, among many others.

Large-scale sculptures from Jorge M. Pérez for PAMM’s sculpture garden:

• Ernesto Neto, Espacio divisorio mínimo, 2008

• Pablo Atchugarry, Endless Evolution, 2015, which will be installed mid-June

Works from recent PAMM exhibitions including:

• Nari Ward, Homeland Sweet Homeland, 2012, acquired from the exhibition Nari Ward: Sun Splashed at PAMM

• Firelei Báez, Sans-Souci (This threshold between a dematerialized and a historicized body), 2015 from the Miami-raised artist’s solo exhibition at PAMM, Bloodlines

• Romare Bearden, Evening 9:10, 461 Lenox Ave., 1964, from the exhibition Romare Bearden, museum purchase with funds provided by Jorge M. Pérez, the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation, and PAMM Ambassadors for African American Art

Gifts and museum purchases

• Yto Barrada, Palm Sign, 2010, from a series included in the Poetics of Relation exhibition at PAMM, a museum purchase with funds provided by Jorge M. and Darlene Pérez

• Mark Bradford, Untitled, a suite of 14 prints, the United States' representative to the next Venice Biennale

• Hew Locke, Hemmed in Two, 2000, a major, iconic installation from Peter Norton, originally presented at the Victoria Albert Museum, London

• Tauba Auerbach, HA HA, 2006, gift of David Hoberman

• Charles Gaines, Numbers & Trees, Xeno #6, 1986, gift of David Hoberman

• Theaster Gates, Breathing, 2010, gift of Deborah and Larry Hoffman in honor of the PAMM Fund for African American Art

• Elliott Hundley, And so I look upon this daylight now, 2009, gift of Beth Swofford

• Youssef Nabil, I Saved My Belly Dancer, 2015, museum purchase with funds provided by Joan Weberman

• Lorraine O’Grady, Art Is…, 1983/2009, museum purchase with funds provided by Jorge M. Pérez, the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation, and PAMM Ambassadors for African American Art

The announcement caps an extremely successful first six months for Sirmans. The museum closed 2015 with 300,000 annual visitors, matching the attendance of the museum’s inaugural year in its new space, and the annual reception for the PAMM Fund for African American Art brought in record-breaking attendance and support. The museum has also hosted major conferences among international peer institutions related to issues aligned with PAMM’s mission, such as fostering the development of art and artists from Latin America and the Caribbean and pioneering new relationships with Cuban artists and curators. Director Sirmans announced today that he will undertake a strategic planning process this fall, as he finishes his first year at the museum.

On April 28, PAMM hosted a free, two-day public program titled Dialogues in Cuban Art. The program brought together a group of Cuban artists and curators to Miami for a series of studio and museum visits and conversations held at PAMM, with their Miami-based peers. It opened up the first dialogue of its kind between Cuban artists living in Cuba and Cuban artists living in Miami, and provided a critical platform for cross-cultural engagement during the highpoint of the U.S.’s changing relationship to Cuba.

In February, the museum hosted the second Tilting Axis conference, which convened 50 of the most prominent artists, curators and leaders who work in the Caribbean or on issues related to the region. At PAMM, they explored the current state of cultural work in the Caribbean and worked towards creating a network of leaders from the region. Anchored in three modules, participants discussed strategies to strengthen networks for exchange and dialogue in terms of education, exhibitions and artists’ movement within the region.

The museum also welcomed the steering committee for the U. S. Latino Arts Futures symposium. This initiative, led by artist Teresita Fernández, explores ways to address the issues of representation, access and equity vis. à vis. Latino visual arts and artists in the U. S. PAMM was selected as the location for the steering committee because of its recognized engagement with, and leadership around, these issues.

“Our work has just begun, but it has begun on a strong foot,” said Sirmans. “We’re entering our strategic planning process knowing that our visitors are returning time and again, that our board members continue to bolster our collection through their generosity, and that our peers around the country and the globe look to us for leadership in the field. I look forward to announcing this fall plans to take the museum into its next phase and beyond.”