A free evening of art, wine and Ecuadorian talent lands in Cuenca on November 11, when EquinoX Gallery hosts the opening of "Entre Sueño y Memoria (Between Dream and Memory)" — a joint exhibition by painter Lorena Duca, photographer Jane Hiltbrand and artist Luis Alberto Medina. The show runs through December 8, with the opening night kicking off at 6 p.m. at Equinoxio's colonial-era building on Calle Tarqui 9-61 and Gran Colombia, a spot better known for its Spanish programmes than its gallery wall space.
The three artists offer quite different lenses on the country. Duca, an Oregon-trained ESL teacher who has now lived in Ecuador for twelve years, paints in bright, humorous colours that riff on life in the Sierra, on the coast and beyond. Her sketchbook travels with her everywhere, and the show includes a commissioned six-foot canvas of the Pase del Niño Viajero Christmas parade — the largest painting she says she has ever attempted.
Hildtbrand, a former Santa Fe real estate professional, has taken Cuenca's Best Photographer GringoPost award four years running. Her work documents the city's UNESCO-listed historic centre and its people; earlier this year she mounted "Mujeres de Cuenca, Fuerza y Belleza", a portrait series eight years in the making, at the Casa de Las Posadas Cultural Center.
The heavyweight name here is Luis Alberto Medina of Quito, an architect-turned-painter and a leading figure in magical realism whose work has shown across the US, Canada, Mexico, Malaysia, Singapore, Spain and Switzerland. In 2025 Ecuador's National Assembly awarded him the Vicente Rocafuerte Medal for his contribution to the visual arts, and he appears in Rodríguez Castelo's dictionary of twentieth-century visual artists. His canvases draw on Andean indigenous culture, nature and family, and he describes his painting as his life translated into texture, shape and colour.
Ceramist and Cuenca fixture Eduardo Segovia will introduce the artists on opening night. For travellers, this is a genuinely local cultural evening rather than a tourist show — and it's free. If you're in Cuenca between mid-November and early December, an hour at the gallery pairs nicely with wandering the city's colonial streets, and the Pase del Niño parade painting is a good preview of Cuenca's famous Christmas celebrations, which peak on December 24.
