Pérez Art Museum Miami Announces Partnership with the Green Family Foundation, Expanding the Caribbean Cultural Institute
The $5 million gift creates new collaborations with The Kimberly Green Latin American and Caribbean Center at Florida International University and Green Space Miami.
Additional support from the Mellon Foundation brings Miami benefactors together to sustain the accessibility and impact of CCI.
(MIAMI, FL — December 4, 2025) — Pérez Art Museum Miami (PAMM) is honored to announce a significant gift totaling $5 million from the Green Family Foundation (GFF) in support of the museum’s Caribbean Cultural Institute (CCI), a program aimed at advancing the study of Caribbean art while providing opportunities for exchange and collaboration across the region and its diasporic communities. This transformative investment, part operating support, part endowment, will ensure the long-term sustainability of CCI while expanding its mission across Miami-Dade County. With this gift, CCI will be renamed The Green Family Foundation Caribbean Cultural Institute.
“The Green Family Foundation has always championed access, equity, and cultural exchange,” said Dr. Kimberly Green, President of GFF. “Since 1991, GFF—founded by Ambassador Steven J. Green and Dorothea Green—has been committed to education in Miami-Dade County. Our deepened partnership with PAMM strengthens the creative collaborations, research, and documentation of the cultures that define the region. Supporting CCI means investing directly in the next generation of thinkers, scholars, and artists shaping our future.”
This $5 million multi-year gift deepens the foundation’s partnership with PAMM and establishes new collaborative pathways with Florida International University (FIU) and Green Space Miami, GFF’s platform for supporting Miami artists, co-founded by Dr. Kimberly Green and Michelangelo Bendandi. Through this partnership, CCI Fellows will gain access to FIU’s extensive Caribbean and Latin American research collections, archives, and libraries. FIU will also publish fellows’ research, expanding its reach across academic and international audiences.
The gift will also support paid undergraduate internships for FIU students, connecting emerging scholars to CCI’s research and curatorial initiatives. Green Space Miami will additionally host co-programmed public forums, exhibitions, and annual gatherings that bring together artists, advocates, creatives, and educators from across the Caribbean and Miami-Dade County.
“We are honored by the Green Family Foundation’s extraordinary commitment to the Caribbean Cultural Institute,” said Franklin Sirmans, Sandra and Tony Tamer director at PAMM. “Our collaboration with GFF is built on decades of trust, shared purpose, and a mutual commitment to Miami-Dade County. The foundation’s support ensures that CCI can continue to expand its long-term research, programming, and community initiatives—work that reflects Miami’s identity and deep ties to the Caribbean.”
In addition to the GFF gift, the Mellon Foundation has committed a new $2 million gift to PAMM to continue its support of CCI, further strengthening its programs and impact.
“We are proud to deepen this work with PAMM, FIU, and Green Space Miami,” said Dorothea Green, PAMM trustee. “Extending CCI’s reach means strengthening the cultural and intellectual ties that connect Miami to the Caribbean. These collaborations open doors for students, for artists, and for communities across the county.”
The current cohort of CCI Fellows exemplifies the vision this gift will sustain, spanning art, research, scholarship, and cross-disciplinary inquiry. Artist M. Florine Démosthène, this year’s CCI artist fellow, draws on her upbringing between Port-au-Prince and New York to explore Black female subjectivity and myth, creating lush, mixed-media works informed by ancestral memory and human–nonhuman relationships. Research Fellow Rianna Jade Parker, a writer, critic, historian, and curator, is advancing her ongoing investigations into under-recognized Caribbean and diasporic legacies while contributing essays and programming for institutions from Tate Britain to Somerset House. Meanwhile, the CCI + Women Photographers International Archive (WOPHA) Fellow Celia Irina González, a Mexico City-based visual anthropologist, is delving into archival gaps and migratory memory, building on her participation in international exhibitions including the Venice Biennale, Lyon Biennale, and Kochi-Muziris Biennale.
ABOUT THE GREEN FAMILY FOUNDATION
Established in 1991 by Steven J. Green, former United States Ambassador to Singapore, the Green Family Foundation (GFF) is a private nonprofit organization committed to advancing arts, culture, education, and healthcare initiatives that promote global well-being and reduce poverty. The Green Family Foundation drives meaningful change by funding initiatives that prioritize access and innovation. Through strategic grants, the foundation supports organizations committed to fostering sustainable solutions and empowering diverse communities.
For more than three decades the foundation has also played a significant role in Miami-Dade County’s cultural and educational landscape, particularly in areas connected to the Caribbean and Latin America. This includes long-standing partnerships with Florida International University through the Steven J. Green School of International and Public Affairs, the Kimberly Green Latin American and Caribbean Center, the Digital Library of the Caribbean, the Green Emerging Artists Fund at the Frost Art Museum, and the Green Library, as well as support for community organizations such as Miami Book Fair, WOPHA, and O, Miami. These efforts reflect the foundation’s continued commitment to access, education, and cultural exchange throughout the region.
ABOUT THE CARIBBEAN CULTURAL INSTITUTE
The Caribbean Cultural Institute (CCI) is a curatorial and research platform at Pérez Art Museum Miami dedicated to promoting and supporting the artistic and cultural production of the Caribbean and its diasporas through exhibitions, research, fellowships, public programs, and collection development.
ABOUT PAMM
Pérez Art Museum Miami (PAMM), led by Franklin Sirmans, Sandra and Tony Tamer Director, promotes artistic expression and the exchange of ideas, advancing public knowledge and appreciation of art, architecture, and design, and reflecting the diverse community of its pivotal geographic location at the crossroads of the Americas. The 41-year-old South Florida institution, formerly known as Miami Art Museum (MAM), opened a new building, designed by world-renowned architects Herzog & de Meuron, on December 4, 2013, in Downtown Miami’s Maurice A. Ferré Park. The facility is a state-of-the-art model for sustainable museum design and progressive programming and features 200,000 square feet of indoor and outdoor program space with flexible galleries; shaded outdoor verandas; a waterfront restaurant and bar; a museum shop; and an education center with a library, media lab, and classroom spaces.
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Accredited by the American Alliance of Museums, Pérez Art Museum Miami (PAMM) is Sponsored in part by the State of Florida, Department of State, Division of Arts and Culture and the Florida Council on Arts and Culture. Support is provided by the Miami-Dade County Department of Cultural Affairs and the Cultural Affairs Council, the Miami-Dade County Mayor and Board of County Commissioners. Additional support is provided by the City of Miami and the Miami OMNI Community Redevelopment Agency (OMNI CRA). Pérez Art Museum Miami is an accessible facility. All contents ©Pérez Art Museum Miami. All rights reserved.
