The main congress at the 16th World Congress on Art Deco took off Thursday, April 20 at Miami Beach’s Art Deco Museum, as we welcomed delegates representing Art Deco Societies across the globe.
Delegates enjoyed generous hors d’oeuvres and cocktails at the museum after an Ocean Drive Walking tour and explored our latest exhibition: Radio Waves: Miami Beach and the Golden Age of Radio. The New World Symphony quartet serenaded us with Deco-era music as global delegates connected in person – many for the first time in years since the pandemic.
The reception was the perfect event to kick off the Congress, which returns to Miami Beach once again, after the very first World Congress happened here in 1991. The Congress was the brainchild of MDPL founder Barbara Baer Capitman, who sadly passed before the first Congress on Miami Beach.
While Capitman is mainly known for her efforts to save Miami Beach Art Deco, her work to spread the passion for Art Deco preservation worldwide led to the formation of the International Coalition of Art Deco Societies, which currently has 27 global chapters. Art Deco Society members, architecture lovers, and new guests from around the globe convened to share in a unique celebration of Art Deco and Modernism in the place where the Art Deco preservation movement began back in the 1970s.
This event followed the pre-congress in Central Florida, where guests visited the Bok Tower and Gardens, Old Dixie Highway, Florida Southern College, and the Maitland Art & History Museums.
Learn more about the 16th World Congress on Art Deco here: https://www.16thworldcongressonartdeco.com/
The Congress is made possible with the generous support of the Greater Miami Convention and Visitors Bureau, the City of Miami Beach, Miami-Dade County, the State of Florida, the International Coalition of Art Deco Societies, and the Palm Beach Art Deco Society.
