Miami, FL - September 23, 2025 - AIRIE.Foundation, the South Florida-based non-profit organization that empowers artists to think critically and creates affirming spaces at the intersection of art and environment, will present a solo exhibition by artist Charles Humes Jr. in the Nest Gallery at the Ernest F. Coe Visitor Center in Everglades National Park.

Entitled Gatherings, the exhibition will open to the public on October 4, 2025 with a reception from 12-3 PM, and explore the intersections of this ecologically vital environment and its deeply rich cultural histories. In a landscape constantly in movement, ideas, imagery, histories, wildlife and communities find themselves collecting in brief moments, before continuing their nomadic journeys, each leaving a trace and creating moments of gatherings. This collection of thoughts and physical materials have left an impact on the practice of Charles Humes Jr. during his residency in Everglades National Park in 2024 as an AIRIE Fellow and in 2025  as a returning Alumni Resident. 

The Everglades serves as a convening of intersections: water, land, histories, and identities. Through his residency and a revisiting of this natural environment, Humes  explored the histories of communities that are closely tied to this landscape and imagined scenes that depict narratives that have gone visually undocumented, sharing his observations via materiality, color, and composition. With Gatherings, Humes gives viewers a deeper experience and understanding of the complexities of this unique environment and the embedded history.

“Gatherings is a literal footprint of my time, journeys and experiences as an AIRIE.Foundation resident artist,” says Charles Humes Jr. “Everglades National Park has given me a unique platform and canvas to create a body of work about these amazing spaces and places of  nature. Gatherings is a collective of works that depict the grace and wonder of the park but also art inspired about what I personally term as the ‘Southern Underground Railroad,’ a route taken by people of color, Native Americans, Southern Gullahs, Black Maroons, formerly enslaved  people, and Black Seminoles, all using the swamps and marshes of Florida’s  Everglades as home and refuge. Collectively, the works present my visual reflections of the park and my homage to a people slightly forgotten in the formal history of Florida’s early development.”

Charles Humes Jr. was born in Miami of a rich family heritage of Turks & Caicos and the Bahamas. The nationally acclaimed painter, print-maker, draftsman, muralist and educator has been a professional artist for over forty years, and has received many national and regional awards for his signature depictions of the African-American condition. 

About AIRIE.Foundation 

AIRIE.Foundation supports artists working at the intersection of art, environment, and community. Through strategic funding, curatorial platforms, and public programs, we cultivate stewardship, elevate underrepresented narratives, and expand environmental dialogue locally and globally.

For more details, please visit www.airie.foundation or visit us on instagram @airie.foundation