Mari Carmen Ramírez

Mari Carmen Ramírez is the Wortham Curator of Latin American Art and Director of the International Center for the Arts of the Americas (ICAA) at the Museum of Fine Arts, Houston. A globally renowned authority on modern and contemporary Latin American art, Ramírez has published extensively and curated numerous award-winning exhibitions, including Inverted Utopias: Avant-Garde Art in Latin America (with Héctor Olea). She’s also conceptualized and implemented the ICAA Documents of 20th Century Latin American and Latino Art Project, a major digital archive and book series focused on primary sources. Since her arrival at the museum in 2001, Ms. Ramírez has led a long-term transformation in the appreciation and understanding of Latin American and Latino visual arts in the United States and abroad through acquisitions, research, exhibitions, publications, and a free online digital archive.

In 2005 Ramírez received the Award for Curatorial Excellence granted by the Center for Curatorial Studies at Bard College. That same year, TIME magazine named her one of “The 25 Most Influential Hispanics in America.”

(Spring 2008, Spring 2010, Spring 2013, Fall 2013, Fall 2019)