Sesc Avenida Paulista opens “Cartas à Memória”

Curated by Yudi Rafael, the exhibition features 90 works by 29 artists exploring Asian diaspora art and political memory.

Starting November 14, 2025, Sesc Avenida Paulista presents the exhibition “Cartas à Memória” (“Letters to Memory”), curated by Yudi Rafael. The show brings together around 90 works by 29 artists from the Americas and Asia, examining the intersections of art, politics, identity, and memory within the Asian diaspora experience.

Art, memory, and displacement

Inspired by the book *Letters to Memory* (2017) by Japanese-American writer Karen Tei Yamashita, the exhibition presents paintings, photographs, videos, installations, and documents that revisit histories of repression, migration, and resistance. The works reflect how wars and political crises of the 20th and 21st centuries shaped Asian migration to the Americas and its cultural legacies.

“The exhibition dialogues with how the author expands the Asian-American geographical imagination by inscribing a North-South axis beyond East-West,” explains Yudi Rafael, who organizes the show into themes such as places, wars, activism, and communities.

Featured works

Highlights include the photographic archives of Corky Lee (1947–2021), chronicling the civil rights struggles of Asian communities in the U.S.; revolutionary posters by René Mederos (1933–1996), created during his visits to Vietnam; and a film by Tuan Andrew Nguyen (1976), blending documentary and myth to revisit a war refugee island in Southeast Asia.

The exhibition also features new projects by Caroline Ricca Lee, Mimian Hsu, Alice Yura, and Lina Kim, who explore migratory narratives and Asian ethnic enclaves in the Americas. According to the curator, recent artistic production merges family memory and imagination, confronting histories of exclusion and war that still echo in global contexts marked by militarization.

Participating artists

Albert Chong; Alice Yura; Alípio Freire; An-My Lê; Bridge; Carlos Takaoka; Caroline Ricca Lee; Chantal Peñalosa Fong; Corky Lee; Danh Vo; Dinh Q. Lê; Dorothea Lange; Flavio Shiró; Gidra; Hisako Hibi; Jane Jin Kaisen; Kiyoji Tomioka; Lina Kim; Mario N. Ishikawa; Masayo Seta; Mimian Hsu; Rea Tajiri; René Mederos; Ryan Villamael; Susan Meiselas; Taís Koshino; Toyo Miyatake; Tuan Andrew Nguyễn; Yoshiya Takaoka.

Service

Exhibition: Cartas à Memória (Letters to Memory)

Curator: Yudi Rafael

Dates: November 14, 2025 – May 3, 2026

Hours: Tuesday to Friday, 10 a.m.–9:30 p.m.; weekends and holidays, 10 a.m.–6:30 p.m.

Venue: Sesc Avenida Paulista – Arte I (5th floor)

Address: Avenida Paulista, 119, Bela Vista, São Paulo

Phone: +55 (11) 3170-0800

Accessibility: tactile table, audiodescription, tactile objects, sign language video, and captions

Admission: free | suitable for all audiences