Monumento

The “Monumento” exhibit took place in a historic airplane hangar in Coconut Grove, Florida that had once served as the terminal of the Pan American Airways, circa 1933. The Pan American Clipper hangar is also the same location where the captured Bay of Pigs veterans were processed upon  returning to the U.S. in 1963. In the five days the exhibit was open to the public over 3000 individuals attended. On the fifth day “Monumento” was open, it was vandalized and the majority of the artwork destroyed. 

The Bay of Pigs invasion was a turning point in U.S.A. history being it was a failed attempt to overthrow the Castro dictatorship. The invasion was sponsored by the C.I.A. and was the first defeat the USA experienced in the 20th Century. After the long-fought success of the Korean War the failure of the Bay of Pigs invasion heralded a romantic sympathy for modern revolution and dissent for foreign intervention by the government that peaked with the following war in Vietnam.