The third day I was in Miami was a long day of Fairs and events. The first Fair I visited was Pulse. This year the Pulse Art Fair moved from its former location in the Wynwood area to the Ice Palace Film Studios, which is more south and closer to downtown then last year. Many fairgoers may remember that this was were the NADA Art Fair was housed for several years.
Miami based artist and great friend of mine Freegums had a wheat paste up across the street from Pulse advertising his event coming later in the Art Basel week.
PULSE MIAMI 2009
'Okay Mountain Corner Store' by Austin collective Okay Mountain was a fair highlight. 'Corner Store' was a commission from Arthouse, a Austin, TX contemporary arts center.
Inside the Okay Mountain corner store.
The Artlog booth had great new work by my friend Manny Prieres.
In the same Artlog booth right next to Manny Prieres's drawings were some new Friends With You watercolors.
I caught some of Columbian Performance artist Maria Jose Arjona's performance, with Siamese fighting fish. I can't decide if this is poetic art performance or a tragedy waiting to happen.
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The Jen Beckman Gallery showed a booth full of paintings by Painter Sarah Mckenzie
Cody Hudson aka struggle inc. had fresh new work at Andrew Rafacz Gallery.
The Dean Project showed this piece by Sangbin Im 'Seoul,' 2008. 40 x 87 inches. This take on a cityscape photo manipulations was an interesting contrast to Andreas Gursky's perfect cityscape which was displayed at the Miami Art Basel Miami Beach Art Fair.
RWFA Rick Wester Fine Art showed several pieces by Meghan Boody. This one is titled 'It was one of those exquisite days that come in winter, in which it seems no longer the dead body, but the lovely ghost of summer,' 2006 printed in 2009. Until seeing this booth I hadn't seen these and although I am still thinking about them it's interesting for me to see other artist working with children and constructed images.
Eva and Franco Mattes aka 0100101110101101.org. 'Addio,' 2008
These portraits by Michal Chelbin show at Andrea Meislin Gallery is part of a larger series called Locked and depicts Stas, a 15 year old inmate of a maximum security prison in Russia. Recently this series was awarded fourth place in the Taylor Wessing prize at the National Portrait Gallery. They are strong images. Sadly they seem to lose all their power from their relatively small size and bad placement. Art fairs reward larger sizes. There is just so much art fighting for your attention. Mural sized photography commands more space on the wall and is earlier to view. Unless a small work is given a lot of wall space (and thus importance) they tend to fade into the background.
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The Glue Society, "THE DAY THE DRAGON ATE THE SUN," 2009. Duration: 2 minutes. HD film.
During the morning of July 22nd 2009, the longest solar eclipse of the 21st century passed over Shanghai. Shot using 14 synchronized cameras, this film captures the effect of this phenomenon upon the city and its people while exploring the relationship between ancient mythology and modern China.
The Glue Society, "THE DAY THE DRAGON ATE THE SUN," 2009. detail.
SVA Alum Dinh Q. Le's sculpture and pictures were all over the Elizabeth Leach Gallery. The grouping of images along the back wall is called "Bicycle Repair Signals," 2009 and the sculpture in front of the pictures is titled "I am Large. I Contain Multitudes (1)," 2009.
PPOW Gallery dedicated their entire booth to the images and installation of Portia Munson.
A set of Alex Prager images at M+B.
U-Ram Choe 'Una Lumino Ortus,' 2009 at bitforms.
The Yossi Milo Gallery had this nice arrangement of Sze Tsung Leong Horizons series. It's great to see that the Art Fair hanging has been kept largely in tact for this series.
Right on the next wall at Yossi Milo Gallery were two prints from their current show by Robert Bergman. I have yet to see the show - I hope I can make it over there this week.
Also at Yossi Milo Gallery was this arrangement by Lise Sarfati
The http://www.winkleman Gallery had several standout pieces from Eve Sussman and Rufus Corporation including this video titled 'Red Girls / Blue Girls,' 2007
Eve Sussman and Rufus Corporation 'Extended Family' from their series 'The Rape of the Sabine Women,' 2009
Eve Sussman and Rufus Corporation 'How to Tell the Future from the Past, v.2,' 2009. Three-channel video installation, 40 minutes.
Edward Burtynsky, 'Alberta Oil Sands #6
Fort McMurray, Alberta, Canada, 2007' from the series 'Oil' at Galerie Stefan Ropke.
Airan Kang's Installation of LED-lit book sculpture at Bryce Wolkowitz. These 'Books' were selling fast and I could see why. I really enjoyed them and they even had some of my favorite books made into these hypnotic tributes.
Adler Guerrier at Miami's Locust Projects.
Robert F. Hammerstiel's series 'Private Stories' at Vienna GalleryLukas Feichtner
Another Robert F. Hammerstiel's series 'Private Stories'
After all that walking around at Pulse I was looking forward to what the Scope Art fair had to offer. Judging by what I ended up photographing there wasn't much that struck my eye. Here are my highlights:
SCOPE MIAMI 2009
Cara Phillips Ultraviolet Beauties at AUREUS Contemporary.
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Sweat Shoppe's Magic Paint Roller was great to finally see in person. check out the video demonstration here: http://vimeo.com/7012935
A bunch of Jen Stark were in Miami gallery Carol Jazzar. Colorful and precise as ever.
Jean-Francois Rauzier's 'Bibliotheque Ideale 2' was breathtaking and selling well at London Gallery Waterhouse and Dodd.
Design Miami 2009
Although I didn't have time to stay long at Design Miami. I really wish there was enough time to have come back here. These design and furniture pieces are a really nice contrast to the art works at the fairs.
the first stop in Design Miami was Workshop Workshop, a marathon zine making workshop created by artist Jim Drain, poet P. Scott Cunningham. Tonight's zine leaders were BFF and Pizza Dog.
This Audi A8 show space was a heavy but fun contrast to the Workshop Workshop zine making party next door.
This Tom Dixon chair has a great back story you can read it in the NY tImes here.
After Design Miami there was a mad dash to see the some of the murals installed in a project produced by Deitch Projects and Goldman Properties called The Wynwood Walls. There were too many great murals to show all of the pictures I got here. This one below is by Os Gemeos.
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"It is a unique celebration of human potential inspired by Lance and dedicated to the fight against cancer."
The last event of the night was one of my highlights for the trip. Lost of high quality art, a good croud, free flowing drinks and snacks, great music and a even better cause. The event was coproduced by Miami's O.H.W.O.W. Gallery.
From left to right. Yoshitomo Nara, 'Fire,' Acrylic on wood panel, 91 x 91 cm and Andreas Gursky. Tour de France I' 2007. C-print mounted on plexiglas in artist's frame, 90 x 66 cm.
Ed Ruscha, 'Vital to the Core' Acrylic on linen, 61 x 89 cm.
Richard Prince. 'I'm Not Coming Home.' Collage and acrylic on canvas, 117 x 86 cm.
Cai Guo-Qiang 'Tree With Yellow Blossoms,' Gunpowder on paper, mounted on wood as a four-panel folding screen, 230 x 310 cm.
Shepard Fairey threw down the quality tunes for part of the night.
Os Gemeos 'O Coletor de Cabecas,' Spray paint and paint on canvas, 160 x 99 cm.
Catherine Opie 'Untitled (Road)' C-print, 61 x 81 cm.
At the end of the evening there was a fantastic performance by Bradford Cox performing as Atlas Sound.
