moník molinet
Pinar del Río, Cuba, 1989
Is a Cuban visual artist living and working between Cuba and Mexico. Her practice spans photography, video, installation, and performative interventions, and engages the image as a critical tool to question symbolic constructions, social hierarchies, and structures of power from a feminist perspective.
Her artistic development has been largely self-taught, shaped by sustained research and long-term projects, following an early background in classical music and performing arts at the National School of Arts in Havana.
Molinet has presented major solo exhibitions, including Masculinities at Fábrica de Arte Cubano and Borrowed Grandparents, an official solo exhibition of the 15th Havana Biennial, which received international awards and critical recognition. She is a beneficiary of the UNESCO Transcultura Program in collaboration with PhotoEspaña, and her work has been exhibited and published internationally.
artist statement
My practice is articulated through an expanded use of the image as a critical device to interrogate structures of power, symbolic construction, and forms of representation that organize the social, the affective, and the political. I work with photography, video, installation, and performative interventions, understanding the image not as a reflection of the world, but as a field of tension where dominant narratives are produced, reproduced, and can be rewritten.
I am interested in long-term processes, accumulation, and repetition as formal and conceptual strategies. Through operations of montage and execution, self-portraiture, collage, archive, or spatial intervention, I seek to complicate the meaning of the image and resist closed readings or fixed identities. From a feminist perspective, my work addresses themes such as identity, masculinities, the body, romantic love, and the symbolic architecture of power, conceiving artistic practice as a site of critical responsibility and dispute over systems of representation.
Exhibitions
2025- 2026 (Nov – Feb) “HB Contemporary Cuban Art,” Group exhibition, Galería Habana, Havana, Cuba.
2025- 2026 (Nov - Mar) “For Social Inclusion,” Solo exhibition, La Quinta x La Pistola, Quinta de los Molinos, Havana, Cuba.
2025 (Nov) Official Selection “Photographic November,” Group exhibition, Ludwig Foundation of Cuba, Havana, Cuba.
2025- 2026 (Nov – Feb) Official Selection “Photographic November: Doors to Ingenuity,” Group exhibition, Fábrica de Arte Cubano, Havana, Cuba.
2025- 2026 (Sep - Jan) .“Borrowed Grandparents” Solo exhibition, Tragaluz Photography Festival, Morelia, Mexico.
2025 (May – Sep) “Ojo de Agua: Photography and Video by Cuban Women Artists,” Group exhibition, International Press Center, Havana, Cuba.
2024- 2025 (Nov - Feb ) “Borrowed Grandparents,” Solo Exhibition Oficial Selection of 15 Havana Biennial, Malecón Art 255, Havana, Cuba.
2024 - 2025 (Nov - Mar) “HB 2024,” Galería Habana, Group exhibition, Oficial Selection of 15th Havana Biennial, Cuba.
2024 Group Exhibition Fotocanímar Festival, Matanzas, Cuba
2024 (April) “A Happy World,” Galería Habana, Havana, Cuba.
2024 (March) “Beyond Roots,” Factoría Design, Havana, Cuba.
2023 - 2024 (Oct – MAY) “Women Between Utopia and Dystopia” Group exhibition, Factoría Habana, Havana, Cuba.
023 (Abr) “Masculinities,” Solo exhibition, Fábrica de Arte Cubano, Havana, Cuba.
2022 “Dissidences of the Body,” Group exhibition, Haba Gallery and La Galería by LastCrit, Barcelona, Spain.
2022 (Mar- Jul) Alicia Alonso International Photography Award – Winners Exhibition, public spaces along San Rafael Boulevard, Old Havana, Havana, Cuba.
2021 (Mar – April) “Humans of the World”, Life Framer (exhibition derived from the Second Prize), Galerie Écho 119, Paris, France.
2021 “Humans of the World”, Life Framer, Fisheye Gallery, Arles, France.
2021 “Humans of the World”, Life Framer, Officine Fotografiche Gallery, Milan, Italy.
2021 (May – May) “The Female Body: Rebuilding a Collective Memory”, virtual exhibition, MIA Anywhere Museum.
2021 (Mar 13 – Mar 28) "FEMME. Now we women speak", Haba Gallery, Barcelona, Spain.
2020 (Nov 29 – Dec 19) “Humans of the World”, Life Framer (exhibition derived from the Second Prize), Contour Gallery, Rotterdam, The Netherlands.
2019 “Aurora Home Festival”, first online Art and Music Festival in Latin America, Art gallery program.
2019 Contact Photography Festival, Group Exhibition, 500px Gallery, Toronto, Canada.
2018 Photo Mexico, group exhibition, Óscar Román Gallery, Mexico City, Mexico.
Awards and Recognitions
2026 Finalist International Self-Portrait Award KlphotoAwards
2025 Selected in the book “Women Photograph Year in Pictures”, Women Photograph
2025 Selected in the book “Art and Woman, Life and Creative World of 100 Women Artist from around the world. Arts to hear Project
2024 Innovate Grant Honorable Mention 2024 Borrowed Grandparents
2024 OD PHOTO PRIZE 2024 Judge Selection Borrowed grandparents
2024 Beneficiary Unesco Transcultura Program together with PhotoEspaña
2022 “World Travelers” Life Framer/ Judged by Steve Mccurry Magnum Photo
2021 Mention in Portrait / Alicia Alonso International Photo Contest
2021 Mention in Backstage / Alicia Alonso International Photo Contest
2020 2dn Prize "Humans of the World" Life Framer/ Judged by Amy Kellner, Photo Editor at The New York Times.
Photography Books
2025 “Women Photograph Year in Pictures”, Women Photograph
2025 “Art and Woman, Life and Creative World of 100 Women Artist from around the world. Arts to hear Project
2022 Alicia Alonso International Photography Award Winners
Conferences/ Talks & Masterclass
2025 (Nov) Panelist at "Theoretical Program Orange Day in Cuba: Art Against Invisible Violence" Cuban Art Factory, Havana, Cuba
2025 MasterClass Retrato, Clavijero Cultural Center, Tragaluz Photography Festival, Morelia, Mexico
2025 Open Talk about my work with Jesus Cornejo, Opening Tragaluz Festival, Clavijero Cultural Center, Morelia, Mexico
2023 Workshop: "Gender and image, from what is written to what is seen" Faculty of Communication University of Havana
2021 On Photography, Talk at the Faculty of Art and Design, National Autonomous University of Mexico (UNAM)