Toddling our sweet selves out to day one of Miami Art Week, the experience promised to be a varied affair depending on which end of the hologram one is peering through.
Curators, global arts experts, gallerists, event co-ordinators, international artists of merit or the talented newbie, for one long week, share the same zip code with intrepid party-goers looking for the next late night Champagne and glitter glam, rubbing VIP passes with celebs from all the food groups. Reporters are left with the job of sifting through rubble and riches to find the “there” out there.
LEFT: Gagosian Gallery, ABMB, (Photo courtesy of ABMB). RIGHT: Gallery 303 ABMB (Photo courtesy of ABMB).
Five days later, early sartorially chic footwear deteriorated to colorful running shoes, our slightly worse for wear sensibilities chock-a-block with photos, video clips, paintings, sculpture, mixed media, installations, film and all things contemporary.
Picasso once so elegantly stated that “The purpose of art is washing the dust of daily life off our souls.” (I am here to tell you that I now possess a squeaky clean soul.)
Where to start:
LEFT: NADA at the Ice Palace (photo by Irene Sperber). RIGHT: Bulleit Bourbon founder, Thomas Bulleit, Jr. and Neon collector and artist Lisa Schulte at Eden Roc bash for Saachi Art's partnership with Pantone (photo by Linda Blaustein).
Design Miami’s off-piste satellite installation was a restful moment of whimsy, amusing to all. COS Design collaborated with London-based Studio Swine creating an “interactive, multi-sensory installation” in the Miami Beach historically varied deco Temple House by Lawrence Murray Dixon. Slightly smaller-than-soccer-ball-size globes filled with mist wafted from a ceiling sculpture, lightly glancing the floor before quickly disappearing into a momentary pool of ethereal smoke. What I got out of this was to pay attention to life before I poof away into a cloud of mist and disappear forever. Okay, next lesson from the world of art projects . . .
LEFT: Ti Taeoalii, AQUA (photo by Irene Sperber). RIGHT: Julian Opie, ABMB (photo courtesy of ABMB).
Swooping through the major fairs, I gravitated toward Korean artists every time; thoughts, ideas and concepts come together into beautiful pieces artfully executed. They dragged me in, without fail, the better to peer ever closer... pieces were not as they first appeared, and the surprises were inevitably satisfying. Forbes named the Kukje Gallery, (Seoul) as one of the galleries in their article A Guide To The Best Asian Galleries At Art Basel Miami Beach.
Five new galleries (20 new in total) made a big “splash” in their debut at ABMB 2017
Sagamore Art Hotel (Photo by Irene Sperber).
- Isla Flotante, Argentina
- TARO NASU, Japan
- dépendance, Belgium
Miami scored two entries in ABMB 2017, the David Castillo Gallery and Fredric Snitzer Gallery.
There was serious of-the-moment discourse in the Conversions section of ABMB. A panel discussion tackling “Is Culture in the Americas in Big Trouble?” (for one) anted up several forehead crinkling topics. Artist Jordan Casteel posited her thoughts to counteract the degradation of our cultural fabric: “Do substantive work every day when you wake up and you look in the mirror and you say ‘I’m going to go into the world and offer it something, whatever it is, today.’”
Brooklyn Museum director Anne Pasternak suggested “There’s not one way (to participate) that’s more meaningful than another. Protest is one thing, building bridges is another, individual personal everyday actions matter.”
Innovative African-American work was more in demand in response to the maelstrom escalating in the U.S.; upscaled support of black artists discussing past and present struggles underlined a need to bring this discussion forward.
Conversely, the art heavily skewed to the pop variety, with photography in short shrift this year, though video was widely incorporated. Most fair goers I spoke with were slightly disappointed at the lack of a moment that grabbed them by the throat. Asking around, I usually was greeted with a pause, eyes traveling skyward before the verdict was levied.
Art Miami was again a favorite among many. The outer shows varied wildly in content and quality according to most.
There was “cautious optimism” as to how successful this fair would be in the market. The highest end included Ellsworth Kelly’s burnt-red painting Sumac, coming in around $4 million to $5 million, along with Roy Lichtenstein’s Ritual Mask at $2.5 million to $3 million, at Lévy Gorvy.
A groaning list of events large and small clashed simultaneously as anxiety mounted making sure one didn’t miss the “best thing,” I hit a few along the way.
The famed and coveted Sagamore brunch was crammed to the rafters despite our first cold front pushing its way inelegantly into the Saturday mornings revelry. We stuffed ourselves under large umbrella ceilings poolside to take in a perfectly perfect sound track from Nu Deco Ensemble claiming to be risk taking. I suppose trotting out electric instruments outside in the swirly whirly driving rain was a bit of a risk. I trotted by The Betsy literary hotel Friday night to jazz and artist’s reception, dance pop-ups and prism projections. Someone waxed into a swoon from running smack into actor and Betsy art exhibitor Val Kilmer.
Aqua art fair nearby was jammed with the young’un’s showing off their very best plumage as I sidestepped a disturbing not-so-childlike full size slide sporting a large pink tongue. Nuff’ said.
The Eden Roc knocked out a bash for Saachi Art's partnership with Pantone compete with neon collector / artist Lisa Schulte aka The Neon Queen. All was bright and sparkly pushing shots of Bulleit Bourbon. Liquid libation purveyors were poured into the week in large quantities to grease the gears on fun and check book writing.
Netherlands-based artists Lonneke Gordijn and Ralph Nauta utilized a cadre of 300 lighted starling-like drones creating an aerial sculpture over the ocean in front of the Faena Hotel one enchanted evening.
The numbers came in for Art Basel 2017. So how'd we do?
The 16th edition of Art Basel in Miami Beach attracted an attendance of over 82,000 influential collectors, directors, curators, trustees and patrons of leading international museums and institutions, according to organizers.
