Jazz at MOCA Celebrates Hispanic Heritage Month with GRAMMY Award-winning Artist Nestor Torres

Photography by Ryan Troy on October 1st, 2018 in Arts, Lifestyle

Nestor Torres

Miami, FL – September 28, 2018 – The Museum of Contemporary Art North Miami (MOCA) celebrated Hispanic Heritage Month with a performance by GRAMMY Award-winning Artist Nestor Torres as part of its monthly “Jazz at MOCA” series. MOCA was packed with jazz enthusiasts who enjoyed cocktails and canapés while dancing under the stars to the rhythms of Nestor Torres. As a flautist, Torres has found inspiration in classical, Cuban, rock, and jazz sounds resulting in a rhythmic and mellifluous flute sound that has become a music genre all by itself. Torres has produced 14 recordings as a solo artist and has been nominated for four Latin GRAMMYS and one GRAMMY nomination, and has won one the Latin GRAMMY Award for his album “This Side of Paradise.” Torres has collaborated with diverse cultural icons such as Gloria Estefan, Kenny Loggins, and Dave Mathews, as well as performances with the Cleveland, Singapore, and New World Symphony Orchestras.

Guests also got a chance to peruse MOCA’s exhibition “Tracing the Red Thread” by Miami-based artist Mira Lehr by donation. Lehr is a fixture in the Miami art community, whose career spans four decades and has affected a new generation of young artists by serving as a mentor and collaborator. The multimedia, museum-wide installation reflects Lehr’s eco-feminist philosophy, the concept of mankind working with nature rather than dominating over it. Lehr uses the classical myth of Ariadne to explore the beauty, fragility and interconnectedness of the endangered aquatic ecosystem of the South Florida coast. In Lehr’s mesmerizing installation, two and three-dimensional works evoke dense thickets of mangroves, the dangerous beauty of jellyfish and the ethereal luminosity of the coral reef. Lehr creates a mysterious world whose seductive beauty reminds us not only of the gifts that nature gives us, but of the importance of preserving them for the future generations. “Tracing the Red Thread” is on view at MOCA from Sept. 6 – Nov. 4, 2018.