With 50+ international contemporary art exhibitors and hundreds of artists under one tent, Art Wynwood will launch its inaugural fair on Thursday night in Midtown with a VIP reception. The sister fair of Art Miami, Art Wynwood aims to distinguish itself on the ever-growing listing of Miami-based art fairs with “cutting-edge, contemporary, and modern artwork by both emerging and established artists,” including many represented by Miami galleries. The fair opens to the public on Friday at 11 a.m. and runs through Presidents Day Weekend until Monday at 6 p.m. To enter to win a pair of full-access VIP passes, simply leave a comment on this post. We will announce the winner in the early afternoon on Thursday.
The Indie Cinema Weekend Roundup is a weekly effort to support Miami’s small film houses, which are the only local venues for new, independent film. This week’s roundup was compiled by Denise Castillon.
A masquerading Ronald Reagan, Storm Trooper DJs, men in drag — just another Second Saturdays Art Walk in Miami. Here are our photos from the evening, captured along N.W. Second Avenue in Wynwood by photographer Robby Campbell.
The Indie Cinema Weekend Roundup is a weekly effort to support Miami’s small film houses, which are the only local venues for new, independent film. This week’s roundup was compiled by Denise Castillon.
Title: ‘In The Land of Blood and Honey’ (USA, drama/romance, 126 minutes, Rated R)
Synopsis: Written and directed by Angelina Jolie, the disturbing, yet titillating In The Land of Blood and Honey, set during the Bosnian War in the 1990s, expresses the brutality of both sides of this horrific conflict through the relationship that develops between a Serbian solider and his Bosnian prisoner.
Just as the Art Basel hangover is wearing off, galleries in Wynwood and the Design District are ramping up for Art Wynwood, a fair that will feature more than 50 exhibitors during President’s Day weekend. While certain galleries seem to be holding off their new exhibitions until closer to the fair, which is based in Midtown (for now), there are plenty of new shows opening this week in time for Art Walk on Saturday. Below are all the new exhibitions on our radar.
The Naked Truth: Nudes and Erotica in Art and Big Bang @ PanAmerican ArtProjects
An exploration of nudity, sex, and eroticism in art, The Naked Truth examines the representation of the unclothed female body through different time periods and media. The works include a painting from the 1940s by Wilfredo Lam, “very explicitly erotic drawings” by Carlos Enriquez, and videos by Tracey Snelling that let the viewer spy on her through her own motel windows. In its project room, the gallery will be screening the video “Big Bang” by Spanish artist Cristina Lucas. “In this sui generis video, Lucas … hired a professional to star in her video, literally writing the words ‘Big Bang’ with a brush held in her vagina.” To learn more about the exhibitions, visit PanAmerican ArtProjects.
'Sagebrush Gulch' by New Hampshire artist Sam Trioli -- photo from site95.tumblr.com
The vacant lot at 44 N.E. 29 Street, next to Morgan’s restaurant in Midtown, is usually nothing more than a patch of grassy land with an abandoned old rusty trailer. But since Jan. 28, the property has been re-purposed as an open-air, pop-up gallery as part of a national project to promote emerging artists.
“I loved the idea of using an available space,” said Meaghan Kent, director and chief curator for site95, a nonprofit established last November to present exhibitions in temporary urban locations. The Wynwood exhibit is site95’s first.
This is the question I address in a piece I wrote for The Atlantic Cities, a very cool online section of The Atlantic that explores “innovative ideas and pressing issues facing today’s global cities and neighborhoods” and a must-read for people interested in how Miami can explode its own potential.
With the Florida legislature currently considering expanding gambling statewide and Genting hoping to build a mega casino called Resorts World Miami on Biscayne Bay, many Miamians are debating whether the expected jobs are worth the expected increase in crime, traffic, and other feared downsides. But how the expansion of gambling to include mega casinos — a whole different beast than anything in Miami’s existing gambling infrastructure — may affect Miami’s emerging arts community, in which so much hope and money have been invested over the last decade, is also a crucial question, and one without a clear-cut answer.
Art Basel Miami Beach has hinted that it may move elsewhere if Miami turns into — or appears to be turning into — Las Vegas East. At the same time, one gambling industry analyst I spoke to believes a mega casino could help Miami artists by employing them. With no existing research on the correlation between casinos and the vitality of the arts in their host cities’, it is hard to predict what will happen in Miami if Genting gets its way.
Nonetheless, that is exactly what I try to do in my story. To give it a read, head over to The Atlantic Cities. After, I’d like to know what you think. Will expanding gambling in Miami hobble its cultural development? Or is the expansion a gamble worth taking?
A new Wynwood gallery will be one of the few to invite window shoppers. -- photo by Sergio N. Candido
The elaborate murals that cover the outside walls of many Wynwood galleries are works of art in their own right, but ever wonder why more galleries don’t have windows that show off what’s inside?
The answer has a lot to do with government bureaucracy, as gallerist Gregg Shienbaum recently discovered first hand while filling out piles of City of Miami paperwork. In order to open his own gallery with storefront windows, he had to obtain permits from the city to change the building’s use from “warehouse” to “retail,” but he thinks it was worth the hassle.
Jad Abumrad and Robert Krulwich, hosts of the popular WNYC show Radiolab, are Miami-bound to stage a live performance at the Fillmore Miami Beach on Wednesday, Feb. 1. Billed as a mélange of science, rock and roll, comedy, and dance, Radiolab Live is an exploration of “the dawn of sight and the evolution of the eye” — a premise that fans of the curiosity-fueled, science-centric radio show might have seen coming. With comedian Demetri Martin joining the hosts on stage and too-talented Thao Nguyen scoring the performance, Radiolab Live promises to deliver on its ticket cost ($51.00-$61.50).
We have a pair of tickets to giveaway to the performance. To enter to win, simply leave a comment on this post that uses “Jad” as an adjective and “Krulwich” as a verb. Example: “That jad wanker krulwiched my sandwich and hightailed.” We will announce the winner of the tickets on the Beached Miami Facebook page on Monday. Until then, enjoy Radiolab’s Miami Vice-inspired promo video. Funny thing is, they probably think Miami’s not like that anymore.
After taking December off to recoup from Art Basel, galleries in Wynwood and Design District opened their doors to one and all Saturday night for Art Walk. It was a brisk 60 degrees, so, naturally, several died-in-the-wool Miamians dressed like members of the Inuit tribe. Here is a selection of the photos I took along N.W. Second Avenue throughout the night.
