Rafaela Kennedy Exhibition on Memory and Spirituality in Mexico City, Digi Mart USA News (Mexico City): Rafaela Kennedy’s exhibition in Mexico City begins with a simple idea: some memories remain in the body even when words fall short. In De vermelho vive o coração, the artist explores that memory through the color red, a thread connecting her childhood in Brazil with new experiences in Mexico.
The exhibition brings together photographs and installations that address spirituality, ancestry, and the ways transfeminine lives keep their history alive. Curated by Sofía Moreno and Rojo Génesis, the show opens at the Museo de Arte Transfemenino (MAT) as an encounter between artists, territories, and memories.
Admission is free until January 15, 2027.
The exhibition’s title comes from a verse of Vermelho, a song by Amazonian composer Chico da Silva. For Kennedy, the reference takes her back to her childhood in Manaus, Brazil, where boi-bumbá culture was part of everyday life.
By combining Portuguese and Spanish, the artist turns that memory into a meeting point between the Brazilian Amazon and Mexico City. Red becomes a thread connecting territories, experiences, and memories that remain present in her work.
One installation, Que se abra tu corazón como las flores, que viva vuelto arriba tu corazón, creates a space to remember and celebrate travesti people who have passed away. The work draws on Kennedy’s spiritual experiences in Brazil and an image of the Rainha do Cemitério that came into her hands in March 2026.
In Mexico, the image opens a dialogue with local traditions of remembrance, especially Día de Muertos.
Rather than looking only to the past, the installation invites viewers to consider how these stories can be kept alive and how spaces of care for memories can be built.
In O mundo gira junto com você, Kennedy proposes an immersive experience through suspended fabric screens and red lighting. Inspired by the song Festa da Raça, also by Chico da Silva, the installation invites visitors to move through the space and feel motion through their own bodies.
The work offers a different understanding of time. Instead of moving in a straight line, past, present, and future meet in a spiral, where experiences continue to transform and accompany us.
The opening brought together a range of artistic and musical expressions. Mexican artist Bruja Prieta presented a DJ set, while Brazilian artist Sodomita gave her first musical performance in Mexico.
Sonidera Abigail La Reina Rumba, recognized as the first trans sonidera in the country, also took part.
The event accompanies the exhibition, which connects experiences and territories through art. Ranging from photography to music, the show presents travesti and trans memories as stories worth sharing, caring for, and celebrating.
The exhibition can be visited at the Museo de Arte Transfemenino (MAT) in the Doctores neighborhood of Mexico City. Entry is free and open to the public until January 15, 2027.
