Contemporary arts show blends Caymanian talent

By Lindsey Turnbull

This week we go behind the scenes of one of the National Gallery’s most important shows, the 4th Cayman Islands Biennial, which launched at the beginning of October, speaking with the Gallery’s Head of Programmes, Maia Muttoo, to find out more about this exciting show.

The 4th Biennial, entitled Archipelago runs from 2 October, 2025 to 18 February, 2026, but the project began many months ago, earlier in 2025, when an open call was put to artists to participate in this exhibition. 

“The Biennial is a really big project,” Ms Muttoo said. “It’s a contemporary art show that takes place every two years and this is our fourth, the first taking place in 2019.”

Biennials take place all over the world, including Venice, Italy, and Havana, Cuba, and give artists, both established and up and coming, the opportunity to respond to the specific theme of the exhibition via whatever medium of art they choose. Artists from Cayman were invited to participate as well as Caymanian artists overseas, expanding the breadth of the exhibition.

“The Biennial allows artists to explore the hot topics of the time, as they relate to Cayman, to the wider Caribbean, and the world as a whole,” Ms Muttoo explained. “Via the Biennial, we can continue to ensure that Caymanians have a space in the wider global arts ecosystem.”

Cayman’s fourth Biennial is taking place over a number of different venues, including the National Gallery, the National Museum, the Mission House in Bodden Town, the Little Cayman Museum, the Cayman Brac Heritage House and Gram Bella’s, a community project space in North Side. It is therefore a big undertaking for those involved in its jury, curation, installation and programming.

Jury’s approach

The jury team was formed by co-curators Joseph L. Underwood and Davin Ebanks, while established curator Kerri-Anne Chisholm completed the jury team. It was their collective task to choose which art would feature in the exhibition, following the response to the call to artists.

Ms Muttoo said the artists could respond to the call by sending in their proposal, which might include examples of their previous work, the artwork itself, or simply showcase their grand idea through sending a concept document. The team would then consider a variety of criteria in order to whittle the numbers down further.

“Given there were more than 125 submissions, this was a very difficult task,” Ms Muttoo confirmed. “The jury considered first and foremost whether the submissions were consistent with the theme.”

For this exhibition, the theme is Archipelago, taking inspiration from the landscape, with Cayman being part of an archipelago of three islands, as well as being part of the wider Caribbean archipelago of islands and then, looking more broadly at the world as a whole.

Ms Muttoo explained that this theme was further broken down into three further sub-themes, which were: ecological legacies – our relationship with the environment; social dynamics – looking at issues such as how technology has transformed our relationships; and culture shift – looking at how culture and heritage has changed over time.

The artists were encouraged to think about these themes not only within the local context but also within the Caribbean and the wider world.

While the jurors considered how the artists had responded to these themes, the artists themselves were able to respond directly to one single theme or encompass multiple themes in their work.

Next week read about some of the exciting contributions to this important exhibition.

Pullout quote:

“Via the Biennial, we can continue to ensure that Caymanians have a space in the wider global arts ecosystem.” – National Gallery’s Head of Programmes, Maia Muttoo