QUEUE Gallery with Catherine Camargo, Miami-based Gallerist and Advisor

Catherine Camargo is taking part to shape the kind of revitalization in the art scene many of us long for. While most creatives are itching to move out of their city and seek abroad opportunities, she does the opposite by challenging and setting roots in her own city through Queue Gallery and her sister project Q Magazine. Against the profitable backdrop of the Miami art market, or what’s mainstream, Camargo chooses to back artists who take risks in their communities. Breaking new ground in Miami’s hustle culture, Catherine’s focus is to prioritize movement over permanence, dialogue over hierarchy, and amplify artists who practice on the lines of language, geography, and identity. 

Queue Gallery was founded in 2024 with a newly opened space in Little Havana this spring of 2026. Camargo’s direction in her gallery program resists commercial predictability and legibility, which is a practice in itself. She brings us tension- foregrounding work that is emotionally charged, politically aware, and often rooted in lived experience. This same commitment towards critical exchange extends into Q magazine, her editorial platform that broadens the life of exhibitions into text and figurative conversation. A solid duo, the gallery and magazine function as parallel structures: one spatial, one narrative-- both invested in preserving artist’s voices that test dominant frameworks in the art business. 

Camargo’s curatorial language is also deeply informed by her heritage as a half-Haitian, British woman raised in Miami - the epic hub shaped by migration, hybridity, and constant cultural negotiation. She builds each project through local collaboration and research, particularly when working beyond her immediate context as seen in her recent exhibition in Mexico-City, where local artists get to combine their practice over the two cities. More intimate, personal stories are shown in I Dream in 2 Languages, where the body becomes a site of transnational belonging of nuance and mindfulness. 

Our conversation with Catherine Camargo is a reminder that many of the most compelling voices shaping the art world today are women who are setting their own terms rather than following the pace of the market. Although relatively young, Queue Gallery has quickly become an ambitious voice, holding an integral and a distinctive position in Miami’s evolving art scene. Camargo has entered the game leading with integrity, care, and a sharp eye for disruption, which hits the refresh button on experimentation. There’s a slight thrill when a new system begins to take its place, asking prominent questions like ‘What culture do we want to build next?’. Over our video conference, it became clear that Catherine’s practice is driven less by certainty than by conviction. It’s precisely that openness to risk and continuous questioning that carries a ripple effect. We’re honored to share the plasmasphere with Catherine and Queue Gallery.

No Hard Feelings? (Liveleak), 2024; Guess (Liveleak), 2024; Acquitted (Sarahfuckingsnyder), 2025; JFK Cory Kennedy, 2024; Blue Crush (LiveLeak), 2024 by Jamieson Pearl. Oil paintings on linen.

Could you start by telling us how you started QUEUE Gallery? 

I launched the gallery in early 2024, it started as a nomadic situation. I was born and raised in Miami, went to an arts high school, and then studied mostly painting and sculpture at the Maryland Institute College of Art in Baltimore. After moving back home, I worked at the Margulies Warehouse Collection for three years and later became a curatorial assistant at the Perez Art Museum here. Through all of that, I started really itching to curate and grasp at any opportunity or space I could find to put on shows. I guess that just snowballed over time. I never really had this goal from the jump that I wanted to open a gallery. It happened more organically through doing pop-ups and wanting to do more and more, and to keep doing it consistently. 

What were the main reasons behind starting both the gallery and the magazine, and how the two operate in conversation with one another?

I knew the gallery was an obvious way to create more visibility for artists I believed deserved more attention within Miami’s art scene, whether they were from Miami, based here, or from elsewhere. After a few successful pop-up shows, I realized people would actually show up. Our community here is really beautiful and supportive in that way. But it was important for me to have the magazine exist in tandem with the gallery so I could create opportunities in different formats, especially for creatives who maybe align more with my editorial vision than my curatorial one.

Writing and poetry have always been a core part of my own practice, and I noticed many artists I worked with also wrote, even if they didn’t necessarily see it as something public-facing. Part of the reason for the magazine was wanting to create space for that. It also became a really intimate way for me to get to know artists better through interviews and conversations, often while I was still developing curatorial ideas around their work.

Alongside the online platform, I release a yearly physical issue that tends to be more playful and experimental. The most recent one, Strippers and Fishing, included an open call to Miami-Dade based artists, photographers, writers, strippers, and fishermen. At this point, the magazine functions as a broader cultural ecosystem around QUEUE. 

Exhibition views from David Correa: Un Gran Amor por La Bomba, 2026. QUEUE x Valentine presents in Mexico City,

David Correa's Solo presentation.

We’d love to hear more about your idea of “safe programming,” what that means to you, and how it applies to the artists you work with. 

This is always a fun question to answer. Having grown up in Miami and been an artist pretty much my whole life, I’ve always been led to believe that you have to leave Miami in order to take your practice seriously. The idea that artists have to seek success elsewhere is rooted in a systematic problem, one that begins with the galleries, in my opinion. So, a lot of what led me to opening the gallery was feelings of frustration.

Frustration with the repetition I kept seeing in curatorial approaches and conversations. Frustration with not seeing the kind of conceptually rigorous work or exhibitions that felt like they were really sparking enough variety of dialogue. At the same time, through doing artist interviews and being more boots-on-the-ground within the scene, I realized there actually is plenty of challenging work being made here. It just often felt like those artists weren’t being granted opportunities to show as frequently. At least, that was my mindset when I started the gallery.

The idea was really just to create a space that could be a little freer in what it shows and less driven by commercial resistance. Though, the further I get into being in this business, the more I understand how the pressure of survival can influence galleries. I think there just has to be a balance. If everyone decides to take a bit more of a “risk” with what they’re showing, the rest of the ecosystem will follow. The local collectors and audiences will be challenged and inspired, healthy competition will brew, the artists in Miami will feel somewhat safer to truly explore and continue practicing here. Removing that safety belt would go a long way for everyone. 

Miami is also just a funny place, kind of an enigma. Everything around us is developing so quickly, the city, the money, the people moving in, but the art scene can sometimes feel slightly left behind, or at least not accelerating at the same pace. Though honestly, the history of art in Miami rebukes that, it’s just historically existed more underground. We don't have the same level of press that other major art cities have.

Trying to push against that perception of Miami’s art scene, and create space for the kind of work I felt was missing visibility and momentum, was definitely one of the major trigger points for opening the gallery and still directly influences the ethos of the program.

You did a solo exhibition in Mexico City, right? And then later the collaboration with Valentine? Are they based in Mexico City?

They’re based between Mexico City and Los Angeles, but they’re also kind of a nomadic project themselves. I think collaborating with QUEUE was their second time being involved specifically with a gallery exhibition project. They host a lot of creative parties and art adjacent events. It’s run by artists Chris Cadaver and Julian Burgueño, both of whom ended up being exhibited in the group show as well with a collaborative installation. They’re basically just two talented guys, the kind of people who somehow know everyone. When I decided I wanted to do the pop-up in Mexico City, someone recommended connecting with them so we could make sure people were actually showing up and hearing about the project.

When I decided I wanted to do a pop-up in Mexico City, someone suggested connecting with them so people in CDMX would actually hear about and show up for the project, especially during busy art week. Originally it was only supposed to be a solo exhibition with David Correa, one of the two Miami-based artists I represent, but the more I spoke with Valentine and the more excited I got about the project, the more it felt like it should expand into a group show alongside the solo. It became a really nice excuse to bring together artists from both Miami and Mexico City and create a dialogue between the two scenes.

Marian Roma, TOQUE DE ÁNIMAS, 2025. Carved wood, embossed aluminum, iron wire, mother of pearl, laser print on cotton paper, acrylic, pins, “milagrito”, antique iron door studs, 925 silver fly and kintsugi. Installation views from I Dream in 2 Languages,

I wanted to ask about the title of the exhibition, I Dream in 2 Languages. Where did that idea come from?

The title came from this feeling that all of the artists in the exhibition shared a kind of hybrid nature within their practices. I also think Miami and Mexico City both carry that same hybrid cultural identity. Every time I go to Mexico City, I end up extending my trip because the art scene and the culture are just incredible. Miami feels similarly culturally in that way. It’s such an immigrant-shaped city, and so many artists here are bilingual or trilingual, carrying multiple cultural influences at once. Even if they were born and raised in Miami, there are visual languages and references inherited through family and migration that become impossible to separate from the work.

I saw a lot of that reflected in the Mexico City artists too, especially through assemblage, found materials, and the way the city itself seeps into the work. It made the exhibition exciting to curate because there was already this really natural dialogue happening between the artists and the two cities.

How did you approach curating within a context that wasn’t your own? What kind of research or groundwork did you feel you needed in order to represent the city properly and make the collaboration work in the best way possible?

It was obviously a little intimidating doing a show outside of the city I’m used to. But I think being able to collaborate directly with artists from Mexico City made it feel much more comfortable because there was never the sense that I was just coming into a city that isn't mine and putting on a show for the sake of it. Being able to work with local artists meant I could also understand the city through their perspective. They know the city better than I do, so having their input naturally shaped the project in a more grounded way. 

I specifically wanted the pop-up to happen during Mexico City Art Week. Originally, I had planned to do an art fair and actually got waitlisted. It would’ve been my first fair ever. But honestly, I think that ended up being for the best because it gave us much more freedom with the exhibitions. The space that Valentine and QUEUE eventually found was this really cool 20-year-old squash center. It still had the original yellow court markings and these huge mirrors throughout. It was massive and gave us enough room to present both the solo exhibition and the group show simultaneously. That setup created a completely different atmosphere than a fair booth would have. I was able to work with far more artists than I could have in a traditional fair setting, and even though there was maybe less security in knowing collectors or curators would automatically find us, it became much more interesting to see who actually discovered the exhibition organically, whether through Instagram, word of mouth, or the posters we were putting up around the city. There was something special about people finding this random squash center during Art Week and stumbling into the project that way. 

Karryl Eugene, Obsession Turned Reality, 2024. Inkjet print on Hahnemühle Photo Rag Bright White paper;

Karryl Eugene, Moving Through, 2025. Dogwood denim, and paper on wooden panel w/ acrylic laser cut.

Installation views from Black Mans Shadow Work, 2025, at Queue Gallery, Miami.

How would you say this exhibition, or even your time in Mexico City more broadly, extends into the work you’re doing back in Miami? Especially in relation to the diasporic and immigrant dynamics you were talking about earlier.

I think it was really about taking the same curatorial language that I already work with in Miami, both materially and conceptually, and looking for artists in Mexico City whose practices naturally fit within that same framework. A lot of the artists there were already working in ways that felt very aligned with the artists I collaborate with in Miami. I’m usually drawn to work that moves beyond the wall like sculptural or spatial works, found materials, assemblage, things that feel physically embedded in lived experience. I think a lot of that visual language inherently comes from existing as a kind of cultural contradiction.  Many of the artists I work with, and honestly myself as well, come from hybrid or diasporic backgrounds where you’re constantly navigating multiple cultural identities at once. 

There’s this idea of living in a borderland, where if you already exist on both sides of the fence simultaneously, your perspective is naturally going to be different. I think many artists in both Miami and Mexico City carry that lens within their work. So the exhibition became about placing those two perspectives into conversation with one another and realizing there actually wasn’t that much disparity between them. As a curator, you never fully know how things are going to exist together until the work is physically in the space. Even with renders or planning, it’s different once everything is installed. But with this exhibition specifically, seeing these large-scale sculptural works from the Mexico City artists alongside the work from the Miami artists felt like this perfect marriage. It honestly came together even better than I could have expected. 

We could actually jump to this one instead. Tell us about your heritage and identity, and what that journey has been like for you, both personally and in the art world. And maybe even as a woman, how you’ve come to understand which parts of that identity you want to carry forward or represent. 

My mom is Haitian and my dad was British. The name QUEUE actually came from my dad passing away almost six years ago. I wanted to honor him somehow without simply naming the gallery after him directly. I liked the idea of QUEUE as both a wordplay and as this image of a constant queue of people circulating through the space, something I know he would want for me, for the gallery. The name has ended up carrying that cross-cultural essence quite naturally.

When I was actively focused on my own studio practice, I was making a lot of figurative Caribbean paintings. At a certain point, it stopped feeling honest. It felt like I was making work inside of an expectation, work people assumed I should be making because of who I was. That realization is part of what led me away from my own practice and more toward curating and working with artists directly.

One of the first exhibitions I did in the downtown space was called Black Man’s Shadow Work. The exhibition explored what existed beyond identity as a singular framework, what two Black male artists were thinking through outside of being reduced to their Blackness. I was really interested in how the title itself created assumptions before viewers even stepped inside, and how the work could complicate or disrupt those expectations. That gentle gap between perception and reality is still something I’m deeply interested in.

Pissing Imitator Insults Refuse Tricky Capture Animal Reinstating Capture Bonds, 2024. Petrified wood, wax, oak, silver; Showing Silvers & Taking Off Skin For Sake of Dopamine Layer of Diophantine equations, 2026. Hand-carved walnut wood, stainless steel; I Learned Quite Nicely— And Only Outside Lady Familiarity Between Common Polemic Gentlemen of Whom the Many Live Life to Sneeze from Their Cocks, 2025. Salt, Steel retractor, carved birch burl. Works by Fharid Latorre.

Installation views from Evidence of Evolution, 2026, Queue Gallery, Miami.

I wanted to develop this a bit further. Not just based on heritage, but on the position you’re in now. When you start representing people, there’s a responsibility that comes with that. We’re also in a position where we’re starting to represent women and truly learning what that means. You’ve also taken on, in a way, representing artists of color and women. Do you feel a responsibility toward those communities? Do you speak to them directly? And how do you try to represent them in the best way possible, or how would you like to?

More than anything, I feel responsible for representing people honestly and not forcing narratives onto their work that don’t actually belong there. That’s something I think about constantly with every artist I work with, regardless of their identity. Though, there is naturally a different sensitivity when working with women of color. I want them to feel heard and represented on their own terms especially because I know exactly how it feels to receive projections based around my identity placed onto my own work.  

In response to whether I feel like I’m speaking to communities directly, I don't know… I think there’s something to be said about simply having a voice in the first place. But having a creative voice, and the space to actually use it, feels like a different kind of privilege. A lot of people in my family, or the women in generations far before me, never had access to spaces and opportunities to explore those sides of themselves within their communities. I try not to lose sight of that, I’m grateful. 

And I understand you being a one-woman show in many ways, because from what we’ve read, it seems like you’re taking on the role of art advisor, gallerist, editor-in-chief, and more, all at once. That’s very impressive. Do you have any directions you want to take the magazine in, or specific areas or subjects you’re hoping to explore? 

Thank you. I have interns helping here and there, but for the most part I do wear a lot of hats. It can be difficult, but I’m honestly ok with figuring things out as I go. 

I’ve made it a kind of personal requirement to publish one physical magazine each year. For this next issue, I want to compile everything loosely into an anthology, artist essays, poetry, and all of the interviews I’ve been conducting over the last few years. I’m really excited about the idea of bringing all of those conversations together in one place. I’ll probably do an open call soon too, which will hopefully bring in even more voices and interviews, especially because transcription and editing is such a time-consuming process, as I’m sure you understand.

Do you usually reach out to locals when you’re doing an open call?

It depends on the project. For the Strippers and Fishing issue, that one was open just to locals. Before that, the first issue was called Luv Letters, and that one was open globally. It was for anyone from anywhere to submit a short writing piece related to love. For the next one, I’m not sure yet. I’m still figuring out how open it will be, and what makes the most sense for it. 

Lorena Vega, Painful shoes need a chair to rest, 2025. Polished and varnished black steel, screws. Installation views from I Dream in 2 Language, Queue x Valentine Presents in Mexico City, a group exhibition with Miami & Mexico City based artists.

What’s your idea of success? This might feel personal, but I’m curious what that looks like for you. Not just professionally as a gallerist or art advisor in terms of selling work, but more internally. And also, as a woman, how do you navigate that and what does it feel like when you reach that point of success? 

I think for me, as a woman, success really comes down to freedom. The freedom to show the artwork I want to show and create the kinds of conversations I want to see happening around me. That’s already beginning to happen, but my hope is that as the project grows, the parameters don’t become tighter. I want growth to expand my sense of freedom, not restrict it. On a very practical and transparent level, of course I want the shows to sell because that’s what allows me to continue presenting challenging and different work in Miami. 

I grew up in a very matriarchal Haitian family where creativity was respected, but only if you approached it seriously. The women in my family always carried this expectation that if you choose a creative life, you pursue it seriously and learn how to sustain yourself through it. There’s pressure in that, but also motivation. At the same time, I try not to get trapped in narratives about needing to work twice as hard because I’m a woman. Everyone has to work hard. I’d rather spend my energy actually doing the work than letting myself get consumed by narratives around limitation or victimhood. 

There will always be labels and boxes to crawl out of, especially coming from Miami. But ultimately, you just can’t care that much. Two things can be true at once. I think there is also something empowering in that. As a woman, maybe my voice is received differently, but I carry a perspective that is different too. There is a kind of maternal care in how I approach what I do. I think that becomes a strength unique to us as well. 

We’re also excited to hear about your most recent exhibition. Congrats on your first show at the new gallery location!

Yes, it’s in Little Havana which is a really old-school Miami neighborhood. It’s one of the few areas that hasn’t been heavily touched by gentrification yet, the exhibition space has this very lived-in, layered feeling. I’ve been kind of obsessed lately with slightly corny but heavy, very memorable titles, and Evidence of Evolution was one that really stuck with me. The show came from thinking about this moment we’re in, both from an artist and curator perspective, where everything can feel overdone or oversaturated. It sometimes feels like there’s not much untouched ground left, like there’s nothing “new” to paint, or no materials that haven’t already been explored. So the exhibition is really responding to that feeling of stagnation, and asking what it means to still push forward anyway. It’s about how these two artists are still finding ways to push boundaries, materially and conceptually, even within that sense of constraint. For example, Jamieson Pearl is doing these glitch paintings based on leaked celebrity images, which already points to a very contemporary condition. Twenty or thirty years ago there was no digital “glitch” language in painting because screens and that kind of image circulation didn’t exist in the same way. And then Fharid LaTorre is working with self-taught processes, carving and material approaches that feel both very traditional and very present at the same time. The whole exhibition is really me looking at what artists are doing right now to keep renewing their practice, and to still feel like there’s something left to discover. 

Exhibition views from Weeping a Petroleum Lubricant. David Correa: Solo & Screening at YoungArts Miami, 2024;

David Correa, Death Veil 01, 2024. Steel, plexi glass, head wrap worn by performer.

What does the rest of the year look like for you guys?

I am still finishing up the new gallery space in Little Havana. We just moved there between the Mexico pop-up and now I’m working on renovating one side of the gallery. The first side is already finished, which is where our current show is. So right now I’m just excited to be in one place for a little while. I don’t ever really want to fully drop the nomadic format though, because I think it’s a beautiful new way of operating for galleries. I love the idea that I can do a show in Mexico City and it can still be QUEUE, and I can still have something running at home, and everything still counts as part of the same ecosystem. So I think what’s next is really just enjoying that sense of consistency in one space, and seeing how I can deepen conversations with the local community and artists here, while continuing to invite artists from elsewhere to come and show in the space. 

Finally, are there any other cities you would consider collaborating in, or that draw your interest curatorially or culturally? 

London, Paris. I would love to do more work in Mexico City honestly. I really have fallen in love with it there. But I’m itching to go back to Europe and do projects there, to have that Miami-European conversation. I honestly don't have an immediate desire to do anything in New York City, no offense. I just feel like there’s already so much happening there, there’s already such a constant flux of great artists and activity. If anything, I think what interests me more is the idea of taking artists from places like New York and bringing them into other territories instead, seeing what happens when you shift that context. For example, maybe one day I’ll meet a NY gallerist who also has a brick and mortar but also enjoys the nomadic format, and we swap spaces for a show…. Something like that could be fun. The doors are only just beginning to open for me.

I’m eager to get back to Europe and spend time doing studio visits with artists I’ve admired from afar for years. I’m really interested in continuing a dialogue between Miami artists and places internationally. I think this is partly why I’m okay with the slow and sometimes painful pace of building a gallery. There are so many places I want the project to reach, and I know that takes time, money, travel, and patience. I just need to meditate and pray a bit more, because I know it will all come into fruition. 

QUEUE Gallery Official Website

QUEUE Gallery on Instagram

QUEUE Gallery Current Exhibition

Hugo Montoya, Hasta Aqui Llegamos, 2025. Paint on canvas, rubber tire. Installation views from I Dream in 2 Language, Queue x Valentine Presents in Mexico City, a group exhibition with Miami & Mexico City based artists.

Florida is so fun with her, Ryan Lee's first solo exhibition in Miami at QUEUE Gallery, presents a series of airbrushed paintings and sculptural works drawn from everyday photographs and personal experiences. Blending humor, tenderness, and absurdity, Lee explores the emotional traces people leave behind in ordinary spaces, embracing contradiction and instinct over fixed narratives. The exhibition reflects on love, vulnerability, and the unexpected freedom found in uncertainty, inspired in part by the artist's recent move to Florida. Stop by the gallery, the exhibition is on view till July 31st.

Catherine Camargo Photography: Clarence Josey II.