MAIN MENU
MAIN MENU
The chair of the Miami Beach Arts Trust and founder and publisher of miamiartzine.com. Harvey J. Burstein is the director of the Burstein Family Foundation and has been prominent in the Miami art scene for many years. He co-founded the Miami Gay and Lesbian Film Festival and has worked closely with Art Center/South Florida and SAVE Dade, Ballet Gamonet Maximum Dance, First Night, Florida Room Film Festival, Lavender Footlights, Miami Light Project, Miami Performing Arts Center Legacy Plaque Project, New Israel Fund, New Theater, Pridelines Youth Services, South Florida Dance for Life, South Beach AIDS Project, Swim for Life, Theater League of South Florida, Weitzman Institute of Science in Israel, Carbonell Awards Committee, and the CAJE Miami Jewish Film Festival. His several honors include the Horizon Community Service Chicago Community Spirit award, the Miami-Dade Gay & Lesbian Chamber of Commerce Leadership and Support Awards and the Ambassador of the Arts Unsung Hero Award.
Michelle F. Solomon, M.A., is the editor of miamiartzine.com. She is also theater critic for miamiartzine.com and theater critic for Florida Theater On Stage. She's a member of the American Theater Critics Association and the Florida Film Critics Circle.
A graduate of Emerson College, Boston, Mass., with a master’s degree from the State University of New York, Michelle has been arts editor at major and mid-sized newspapers, including executive arts editor of the Albany (N.Y.) Times Union and assistant features editor/entertainment at The Detroit (Mich.) Free Press. She was an on-air entertainment reporter and managing editor of new media for NBC affiliate, WDIV-TV, Detroit, and executive producer of new media at ABC affiliate, Miami’s WPLG-TV, Local 10.
She is currently a syndicated movie reviewer for Internet Broadcasting/Local10.com, and is managing editor of Fisher Island Magazine, editor in chief for International Publishing Concepts, and Chief Content Officer of Editorial Content Providers, LLC., a company she owns that is a content provider for luxury publications and online media.
Michelle is also a feature writer for Broward Health magazine and Nova Southeastern University's Lasting Impressions and Horizons magazines. In her spare time, she performs stand-up comedy. No, she never sleeps.
Cameron Basden is miamiartzine.com's dance writer. Basden has had a career in dance spanning more than thirty years. She served as Ballet Master and Co-Associate Director of The Joffrey Ballet from 1993-2008 and Director of Dance at Interlochen Center for the Arts from 2009-2015.
Basden was a muse for Gerald Aprino in the creation of his ballets and she has staged ballets by Ashton, Cranko, Massine, Nijinsky and Nijinska as well as more contemporary works. She brought to fruition the first Joffrey summer intensive in Chicago leading to the development of the Joffrey Academy.
She worked on the PBS filming for their Dance in America series of The Joffrey’s production of Billboards, and oversaw the filming and staging of the ballets in Save the Last Dance. As a performer with Joffrey Ballet, Basden danced in a variety of styles by such choreographers as Sir Frederick Ashton, George Balanchine, John Cranko, William Forsythe, Paul Taylor and Twyla Tharp. Roles were created on her by Mark Morris, James Kudelka, Laura Dean, and Choo San Goh to name a few.
Television credits include the Dance in America series Homage to Diaghilev and The Search for the Rite of Spring. In 2003 she portrayed herself in Robert Altman’s movie, The Company. Basden serves on the board of The Gerald Arpino and Robert Joffrey Foundation and is the main repetiteur.
Charlotte Libov is a former journalist who worked as a regular freelance contributor to the New York Times, following a career in daily newspapers in New England. Her experience also includes being a feature writer for several magazines, as well as a weekly restaurant reviewer for the Hartford Courant for several years.
She is also an award-winning author/co-author of six health books, and speaker on health topics, having lectured throughout the country, at the U.S. Army War College, Toyota, IBM, Duke University, and more, and has appeared as a health expert on television and radio shows. She also served as associate producer and appeared on the nationally broadcast PBS special, “Women’s Hearts at Risk, "which was nominated for a regional Emmy.
Upon arriving in Miami Beach, Charlotte worked as a real estate writer for Miami Today, then moved to freelance work, where her byline appeared in many publications, including airline publications (American Way, AirTran’s Go), Florida Travel + Life, the Sun Post, Coral Way magazine, and others. She also had her own column on Examiner.com.
Her photography has appeared in several juried shows, including in miamiartzine.com.
When not writing or taking photographs, Charlotte can be found studying voice, and also hitting any karaoke or piano bar she can find.
Born and raised in Puerto Rico, Ruben's love affair with the moving image began at an early age, even after refusing to play Winnie the Pooh at his first-grade graduation. Reviewing gigs at the University of Akron's The Buchtelite and The University of Miami's Miami Hurricane gave way to a six-year-stint as a program consultant for the Miami Gay & Lesbian Film Festival. For over 16 years he has turned Miami's suburban housewives into foreign-film fanatics behind the counter of several Blockbuster stores. This Disney freak and longtime Michael Bay foe has been a Miami resident since 1995. An occasional participant on the Stonewall Live podcast and a regular contributor to miamiartzine, SunPost Weekly and Beached Miami, he became a member of the Florida Film Critics Circle in 2011. And yes, he liked Terrence Malick The Tree of Life much more than you did.
Irene Sperber grew up in Maine, and quickly expanded her life to include blocks of time living in New York, Hong Kong and London before settling in Miami for the past 20 years. Irene has spent several months of the year in NYC for the past 30 years. A life long artist, the creative path has meandered through art-to-wear, pen and ink drawing, collage and ultimately photography, exhibiting in venues both locally and internationally. Free lance writing and essays now take precedence. Outside interests include hiking, biking and exploring back streets and hidden enclaves unsullied by modern life.
Description coming soon.
Marvin Glassman has been part of the miamiartzine.com team for the past seven years previewing performing arts shows throughout Miami-Dade County.
Prior to writing for miamiartzine.com, Marvin wrote on cultural arts and sports for the Florida Jewish Journal for 15 years; Before moving to Miami-Dade County in 1990, Marvin wrote on the cultural arts and sports for Canadian Jewish News in Montreal and Toronto for two decades.
Jan Engoren is a writer and former newspaper reporter, originally from New York, who now writes about the arts and culture, now enjoying the South Florida lifestyle.
Growing up in an artistic household, she was introduced to the arts at an early age.
Her writing career began after she was asked one too many times to compose her boss’ emails.
With miamiartzine.com since its inception in 2007, Jan continues to enjoy covering all the arts and culture that Miami has to offer. Her work has appeared in national publications as well as numerous South Florida magazines and newspapers.
In her spare time, you can find her on the pickleball court or enjoying a Margarita at a local Happy Hour.
James Cubby, an adventurer of life, has enjoyed many careers including: actor, photographer, teacher, talent agent, writer, publisher, and tour guide. His work has been featured in national, regional, and local publications around the U.S. including Ocean Drive, D’Vox, Genre, SKIN, Contemporary Woman, Scoop, Groove, Fashion Times, Miami Metro, Where Magazine, LRM (Lincoln Road Magazine), SunPost, Wire, Le City Deluxe, Closer Magazine, MAP, Public Magazine, Ego Trip Magazine, Miamigo, and the Miami Herald as well as websites like cooljunkie.com and MiamiStar.com. He worked as an editor for ZED Magazine, a national fashion entertainment glossy, Night Acts, a regional nightlife publication, V Magazine, a state-wide arts publication, and Wire, a Miami-based lifestyle publication. As a resident of Miami Beach for over 20 years, he’s covered the infamous South Beach nightlife scene and watched the city evolve into a thriving tourist destination. He has authored 25 travel books titled THE CUBBY LONG WEEKEND GUIDE (cities include Atlanta, Miami Beach, Savannah, Austin, Mexico City, Boston, Cancun, and others). Cubby has also worked as a tour guide in the Art Deco District of Miami Beach where he fell in love with the beautifully restored buildings and the rich mob history which inspired the story for his YA novel MOB TREASURE.