Katherine E. Nash Gallery

Design and layout for Vaivén: 21st-Century Art of Puerto Rico and Its Diaspora, a 272-page exhibition catalog published by the Katherine E. Nash Gallery at the University of Minnesota in collaboration with Hidrante, San Juan. The bilingual volume documents twenty-five years of creative expression from forty-three intergenerational artists working within Puerto Rico and across its U.S. diaspora.

The Spanish word vaivén denotes a back-and-forth movement. In the context of this exhibition, it describes the physical and psychological diasporic oscillation of Puerto Ricans traveling between the archipelago and the United States. Showcasing various artistic genres and styles, the project examines the constant, complex fluidity between these two geographies. The catalog functions as a comprehensive survey of how these artists explore the hybridity of memory, language, place, and ancestral knowledge amid the perpetual transnational migrations of their people.

The publication’s physical and typographic systems are derived directly from the concept of diasporic oscillation. As part of the overall exhibition identity, the cover features a custom typographic treatment where the word Vaivén is visually stretched and displaced, graphically mapping the idea of continuous movement. This cover graphic, along with specific interior elements, is printed using Pantone 877c (silver ink).

The book is constructed as a softcover with an exposed Smyth-sewn spine, leaving the structural binding visible. Inside, the layout is organized around a strict two-column grid. This structural framework dictates the placement of the bilingual texts, allowing the English and Spanish essays to run parallel to one another on equal footing, establishing a consistent rhythm across the 272 pages.