Byzantine Bembé

This brand-new bi-lingual Spanish/English illustrated volume celebrates the first major exhibition focusing on the art and career of the Bronx-born (b. 1956) artist of Puerto Rican descent, Manny Vega.

Manny Vega’s art can be found in the form of mosaics and murals adorning street walls, subway stations, cultural centres, and business facades throughout New York’s East Harlem. Much of his work celebrates important figures—particularly women—in the history of the Puerto Rican and Latinx communities. Dubbed “Byzantine Hip-Hop” for its uncompromising technical command Vega’s aesthetic encompasses ancient Mediterranean mosaic-making and the electrifying lines of hyper-detailed Sharpie pen-and-ink drawings.

Richly illustrated with over 100 artworks, 60 other comparative images, and 10 opener images, this volume covers the full range of Vega’s artistic output, from carefully crafted mosaics, including female figures and stylized album covers, to prints and works on paper, dating from the 1980s. Vega’s art has been deeply inspired by the Afro-Brazilian spiritual practices of Candomblé, which combines African, Roman Catholic, and indigenous Brazilian religions, which, along with the neighborhood of El Barrio, and music, has been an anchor of Vega’s visual lexicon. His worldview is colorful, danceable, passionately spiritual, and complex – yet accessible.