THE 100 YEARS SHOW: A Documentary about Artist Carmen Herrera

A special screening in collaboration with Poydras Corridor Sculpture Exhibition presented by The Helis Foundation

September 15 @ 6:00 pm - 8:00 pm

Join us at Ogden Museum of Southern Art on Thursday, September 15 for a special screening of “THE 100 YEARS SHOW,” and a celebration of the recent acquisition of Carmen Herrera’s “Untitled Estructura (Red)” located on Poydras Street and Loyola Avenue as part of the Poydras Corridor Sculpture Exhibition presented by The Helis Foundation.  The FREE event will also include live music presented in collaboration with Cuba NOLA Arts Collective and a cash bar.  

Cuban-American Carmen Herrera was a pioneering abstract painter in the '40s and '50s, but only recently found the recognition that eluded her for most of her career. Born in Havana, Cuba in 1915, she moved between France and Cuba throughout the 1930s and 1940s before settling in New York in 1954. Her work is in numerous public and private collections including Museum of Modern Art, NY; Whitney Museum of American Art, NY; Metropolitan Museum of Art, NY; Hirschhorn Museum, Washington DC; Smithsonian American Art Museum, Washington DC; Walker Art Center, MN; Museum of Fine Arts Boston, MA; Crystal Bridges Museum of Art, AR; Tate Collection, London.

Core to Carmen Herrera’s work is a drive for formal simplicity and a striking sense of colour. Herrera began the sketches and preparations for her Estructuras (Structures) in the late 1960s, around the same time that key Minimalism sculptors including Carl Andre, Donald Judd and Barnett Newman were early in their exploration of the medium. Of the shift from painting to sculpture Herrera has noted: “It became clear to me that the linear elements in my work required a hard surface to integrate structurally the ‘hard edges’.” These works marked an important moment in Herrera’s career, wherein the forms move from drawing, to painting, to sculpture, and her meticulous sharp edges are physically manifested. Her first major exhibition of outdoor sculptures took place in City Hall Park, New York, NY, organized by Public Art Fund in 2019 and traveled to Buffalo Bayou Park, Houston in 2020.

About Poydras Corridor Sculpture Exhibition

Poydras Corridor Sculpture Exhibition, presented by The Helis Foundation is the South’s leading rotating public sculpture exhibition. The Helis Foundation, Ogden Museum of Southern Art, and The City of New Orleans Department of Parks and Parkways work together to bring interesting and inspiring sculptures to the residents and visitors of New Orleans. Poydras Corridor Sculpture Exhibition has installed over 40 sculptures by artists of local and international acclaim on Poydras Street between Convention Center Boulevard and South Galvez.