Miami Art Week - A Visual Summary

Miami Art Week Nov 30 - Dec 4, 2016

Nada Art Fair  
at Deauville Beach Resort - "new or underexposed art that is not typical of the 'art establishment.' "

Neon Parc, Melbourne

Independent Curators International (ICI) New York

China Art Objects, Los Angeles

Pulse Miami Beach
at Indian Beach Park - "a diverse site for the discovery of emerging to mid-career artists'."

Entrance to Pulse with "Miami Marble" work by Ann Spalter.

Beers, London

Erica Prince, The Transformational Makeover Salon

Pinta Miami
at Mana Wynwood - "focusing on Latin American art identities and issues."

BARÓ, São Paulo

Marión Gallery, Panama

taeditions.com, online gallery

Art Miami
at Midtown Miami | Wynwood - "modern and contemporary art from more than 125 international art galleries."

Eduardo Secci Contemporary, Florence

Omer Tiroche Gallery, London

Wanrooij Gallery, Amsterdam

Art Basel Miami Beach
at Miami Beach Convention Center - "the largest art show featuring leading galleries from North America, Latin America, Europe, Asia, and Africa."

Gio Marconi Gallery, Milan

303 Gallery, New York

With Zanele Muholi wallpaper ed. at Stevenson Gallery, Cape Town/Johannesburg. Photo thanks to Matthew Couper.

And of course, there was more... a lot more! Further Miami Art Week info here.

Stone Blind Interactive Installation

Vicky Kapo and I have been friends for decades, but it wasn't until she visited Las Vegas in early May 2016, that we took the opportunity to collaborate on a project. Although Vicky's background is in dance and choreography and mine in photography and collage, we have each incorporated community interaction in previous projects.

We visited a couple of sites in the Las Vegas 18b Arts District, home to the monthly First Friday Arts Festival. A boarded up home covered in graffiti art spoke to us of transience. This once solid site designed for occupation, has become unhinged, adrift from its mooring due to its lack of function. There are also homeless people in this neighborhood whom many choose not to see. In this context, the stones we found at the site, suggested the title for the work: Stone Blind.

Having first 'tied down' the house, we invite First Friday visitors to respond to the question "Where - or what - is home to you?". Some answer in specifics: "New Jersey", "Sin City", "Mexico", "Germany"... and others are descriptive: "Where my found family are", "Wherever love is reciprocated", "The location of my car".

The responses reflect the diverse cultural mix of First Friday visitors - locals, national and international visitors, toddlers in strollers and grandparents with walking sticks. Although the installation itself was transient, the messages live on as a poignant reminder of the importance of a safe, loving home that in reality, not everyone experiences.

Las Vegas 18b Arts District, May 6, 2016. 

Vicky Kapo ties down the house with stones found on the site.

Collaged "Seeing Stones" are interspersed with the stones on site.

First Friday visitors write or draw their interpretation of "home".

A project participant adds his messages of "home" to the temporary installation.

Participants add their messages of "home" to the temporary installation.

Participants' contributions festoon the ties at the conclusion of the project.

Inside Wynn Las Vegas

One of the most visually stunning casinos on the Las Vegas Strip is the 2,716-room Wynn Las Vegas, opened in 2005. The lead designer was Nevada native Roger Thomas and the signature red carpet was designed by French interior decorator Jacques Garcia.

In 2013, Wynn Las Vegas commissioned event designer Preston Bailey to create two major floral installations for the atrium - a hot air balloon and a spinning carousel. The core construction is
fiber-reinforced plastic adorned by more than 110,000 flowers.

Contemporary art from the Wynn Collection can be found throughout the casino including Jeff Koons' mirror-polished stainless steel sculptures "Tulips" and "Popeye".

Large glowing parasols suspended above the hotel lobby

Rotating Carousel floral installation by Preston Bailey

Hot Air Balloon floral sinstallation by Preston Bailey

Floral balls suspended in the atrium

"Tulips" by Jeff Koons

Above the pool area

Topiary gardens leading to pool area

An Artist Residency Experience at The Cosmopolitan of Las Vegas

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Completing an artist residency in a large resort on the Las Vegas Strip has definitely been one of the most interesting art experiences to date. The P3Studio residency is a partnership between The Cosmopolitan of LasVegas and Art Production Fund in New York City. The residency program is designed to provide guests with an interactive art experience, so there is always a participatory element to each project and artists change monthly.

When I open the studio doors to visitors for the first time on Wednesday, December 11, I am not sure exactly what to expect. I have produced two previous audience-participation collage projects – the first took place over a few hours at the London Biennale in Nevada satellite project and the second over a few days at the Life is Beautiful Festival. However, the House of Paper Birds project at The Cosmopolitan spans a few weeks, and at the end of the residency period, I estimate that visitors will have completed two collage panels inspired by the fruit of the Joshua Tree and a large reverse-glass window collage where bird-women reign over a desert landscape. I provide a starting point for each of the works, then with a little guidance, the visitors do the rest.

I hope that during the process, visitors will also enjoy the opportunity to browse a range of fashion, lifestyle and art magazines in the adjoining Reading Room. This area is inspired by the MOCA Grand Avenue Reading Room in Los Angeles and is designed for me by Patina Décor. I also envision conversations taking place around the large studio table amongst friends old and new, as visitors source collage material from the stacks of magazines.

As it happens, my hopes for cultural interchange are exceeded. The P3Studio visitors are of all ages and from all over the states, with many from other countries also. Christmas is fun. I Skype with family in New Zealand on our Christmas Eve, and spend Christmas Day in the studio meeting many family groups who are enjoying the bright lights and festive events on the Strip. There are little toddlers who paste paper strips onto the window collage and charm me by blowing me kisses. There are teenagers who talk about their love of art and leave me little drawings. Some people stay for a few minutes, some stay for an hour or more. And at the end of the residency, the collaborative collage works seem to almost vibrate with the convergence of their collective energy.

I am joined in the weekends by invited special guests who bring elements of the House of Paper Birds to life; artist Shelbi Schroeder appears as an aloof black swan watching us watching her, burlesque entertainer Lou Lou Roxy demonstrates the skilled techniques of the fan dance, fashion designer Mina Kahn exemplifies the exotic in her feathered creations on models Kathy C Liu and Tarah Una Robinson, and entertainer/fashionista Devi Amuro stages an intergalactic fashion invasion of the Reading Room with models Starza and Lashonza Ferguson.

In the same way that collage combines disparate elements and creates something fresh, the residency has brought together my favorite aspects of Las Vegas – fashion, flamboyance, performance and the dramatic desert environment – and created a singular experience within the wider cultural experience of The Cosmopolitan itself. In addition to the residency program, The Cosmopolitan curates the public art program Pause, also in partnership with Art Production Fund, where moving image works by artists such as Tracey Emin, TJ Wilcox and Laurie Simmons periodically take over the large-scale LED signs. The Cosmopolitan brings a wealth of contemporary visual art to Las Vegas, while incorporating local artists into the mix and offering visitors the opportunity to participate in building this creative culture. The positive energy I experienced in this process is something that will always stay with me.

 

Visual Art Is Vibrant at Life Is Beautiful Festival 2014

"Love is Power. Power is Life. Life is Beautiful." The words are scrawled in red, encircling a cut out of a large, purple cactus flower. Pasted to the wall, the flower is surrounded by hundreds of other natural desert elements, with hand-written messages. For this year's Life is Beautiful festival, my proposal submitted to curator Patrick Duffy envisioned a collage installation created by the festival visitors themselves, slowly growing over the three days of the festival.
Attendance numbers were up for Las Vegas' second Life is Beautiful festival held during the last of the warm weather in late October. The focus on visual arts was again strong, with the exhibition venue moving to the previously shuttered Western Hotel, sharing space with the guest speakers in the Learning component. The Street Art Program, again curated by Charlotte Dutoit, brought new works to buildings in downtown Las Vegas. With many mural works from the first festival in 2013 still in existence, the face of downtown has changed dramatically.
I've put together a slideshow with Huffington Post, offering a tour of both temporary and permanent visual art features of the 2014 festival. I can't promise that it's fully comprehensive, but it gives a taste of the visual smörgåsbord available to festival-goers taking time out from the multitude of aural offerings. The first images were taken the evening before the festival opened, when some of the visiting street artists were putting the finishing touches on their works. For further information on artists, see the Life is Beautiful line-up.
The best festivals are uplifting, creating a powerful positive energy that lives on after the festival is over. In the downtown center of a city where stark reminders of the hard-hitting recent recession are still evident, the Life is Beautiful festival achieved that for me. As one of my collage participants wrote, quoting the Red Hot Chilli Peppers, "Destruction leads to a very rough road but it also breeds creation."

The Traveling Miracle Show Crosses the Great Divide

JK Russ is now a blogger for The Huffington Post and has written up The Traveling Miracle Show's road trip from Las Vegas to Reno. We stopped at a number of cultural attractions and small towns en route, including the hauntingly beautiful ghost town of Goldfield, NV, where Matthew Couper photographed me beside a pair of marooned subway entrances. S.B.

Here is an abridged write-up from the Huffington Post:
In April we took an adapted version of The Traveling Miracle Show on the road to Reno, Nevada -- 450 miles north from Las Vegas across the arid Mojave Desert. Although we were following in the hoof prints of the traveling medicine shows of old, we had the benefits of bitumen and a hired Dodge Caravan, allowing us to make the trip in a day.
Our aim was to explore the broader arts and culture of Nevada and to forge personal connections with other artists to help bridge the gap between Southern and Northern Nevada that stems from more than just geographical distance. Competition for steadily decreasing state funding is one of the issues causing division, but we viewed this as even more of a reason for artists and organizations to work together to share knowledge and resources in order to realize projects.
Our first stop was Goldwell Open Air Museum, adjacent to the ghost town of Rhyolite, where we enjoyed responding to the sculptural installations, including German artist Sofie Siegmann's mosaic sculpture Sit Here!. The history of this 15-acre sculpture park dates back to 1984 when Belgian artist Albert Szukalski created his Last Supper installation. Goldwell also offers an artist residency program in the Museum's nearby Red Barn Art Center.
We also visited the historic Oats Park Art Center in the town of Fallon, 60 miles east of Reno. The former school building, built in 1914 has been beautifully restored and now comprises three galleries, a lounge bar and 350-seat theater. There were also interesting works on display by Michael Sarich, Joan Arrizabalga and Patrick Zentz among others, from the private, non-profit Churchill Art Council's regional art collection.

Having navigated the 'Great Divide' between Southern and Northern Nevada, we arrived in Reno just as the sun was setting over the snow-capped mountains and the famous neon lights were blinking on.  We headed straight to Reno Art Works based in the industrial Dickerson Road area that has become a hub for creative enterprises. Founded by Aric Shapiro and Pan Pantoja -- two artists sharing a strong social conscience -- Reno Art Works hosts regular exhibitions, open studios and multi-disciplinary events. After a tour of the venue, we were back the next day to set up for the Reno version of The Traveling Miracle Show. By the time the sun was again setting, Mayra Padilla and I were positioned in the entrance way, as a pair of contemplative human cacti. Behind us, Matthew Couper's painting monkey worked on an animated version of Albrecht Dürer's Melancholia, and Artist Michael Barrett, in minimalist athletic attire, labored to deliver A Truckload of Paradise one shovel-load at a time. His growing trail of sand tracked past Nathan Coté's images of plants miraculously grown from vacuumed dust and Jenessa Kenway's endlessly flowing High Life video installation. Later, 'Ginger Healer' Jevijoe Vitug concocted a restorative, magical brew to share with audience participants.
The short video The Traveling Miracle Show @ Reno Art Works gives a little taste of the event.

The Traveling Miracle Show @ Momas N Dadas

There was a great response to The Traveling Miracle Show at Momas N Dadas New Genres Project House in the Las Vegas Arts District. The First Friday festival brought in an audience who enjoyed the installations, unicorn rides and a Sin Eating feast. Seen here is Nathan Coté's, 'Self Watering Suspended Lawn' and Brent Holmes' 'Sin Eater' also featuring Yasmina Chavez and Ashanti McGee. DJ Cyril Noir and burlesque performer Ella Mental rounded off the evening in style. For further coverage, see the article and footage by Sonya Padgett and Chase Stevens of the Las Vegas Review Journal.

Greetings from Silverado Belle – ‘The Bandit Queen Curator’ from the wild western town of Las Vegas, Nevada….

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I am honored to be invited to guest host this long-running Arts Journal, established in 2005 by my artist friend and partner-in-crime Jo Russ. My focus as a curator is on artists, exhibitions and events shaped by the local culture. SB

From the heart of a miraculous metropolis in the desert…

For my first post, I would like to introduce a one-night art installation and performance event ‘The Traveling Miracle Show’ which I have assisted with in a curatorial role. It opens 6pm this First Friday April 5^th at the new Momas and Dadas New Genres Project House, in the heart of the Las Vegas Arts District. In the tradition of the historic traveling medicine shows, the audience is promised ‘Astonishing Spectacles’ and ‘Miraculous Events’, including a mystical beast, human cacti, an infinite fountain of alcohol, and a cure for melancholia.

            I have enjoyed working with these seven exciting Las Vegas-based artists to develop this touring show which been awarded funding from the Nevada Arts Council and the National Endowment for the Arts. Participating in the show are Artist Michael Barrett, Nathan Coté, Matthew Couper, Brent Holmes, Jenessa Kenway, JK Russ and Jevijoe Vitug. These artists have established reputations in the fields of video, performance and installation. Couper, Holmes, Russ and Vitug participated in the 2012 ‘London Biennale in Nevada’ performance event, proclaimed “an avant-garde success” by Las Vegas City Life. Barrett and Kenway were featured in the 2012 ;Off the Strip New Genres Festival’ at the Las Vegas Contemporary Arts Center. Coté has just concluded his MFA Thesis show  ‘If you can understand this, I’m sorry. The mystery is lost to you.’

            Details for the Las Vegas event are below, and the artists will then take The Traveling Miracle Show on the road to Reno Art Works for the night of Friday April 19^th.

First Friday April 5^th 6:00 – 11:00 PM

Performance Schedule:

6:00 PM onwards ‘Sin Eater’ performance

7:00 – 8:00 PM ‘Desert Bloom’ performance

8:00 – 9:00 PM ‘Unicorn’ performance

Free entry.

Momas and Dadas New Genres Project House, 926b South Casino Center Blvd, Las Vegas, NV89101

momasanddadas.wordpress.com

Off the Strip 2012 ... the event ...

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In the Shadow of the Strip

"The Contemporary Arts Center’s Off the Strip New Genres Festival exists in the shadow of the Las Vegas Strip’s seductive glamour and addictive charms.

The city of Las Vegas is a nucleus of entertainment, risk and romance. It is known for its wedding chapels and since 1911, it’s liberal divorce laws - in other words, the full spectrum of relationships.

Beyond the Strip, Las Vegas is a vast, sprawling city, which most tourists visiting Las Vegas have little concept of. And beyond the city itself, is the Mojave Desert – a vast, inhospitable expanse that many city dwellers never visit.

Nevada in many ways is still the Wild West. It can be a tough place to survive in, let alone thrive in, but the city permits the possibility of fun along the way.

The artists in the Off the Strip festival, whether local, national, or international; have all created works that reflect the glamor, the grunge, the struggles and intricate relationships that are the foundation of Las Vegas and its burgeoning art scene."

- from my Introduction to Off the Strip 2012.

Co-ordinating an entire festival program has been an interesting - and sometimes challenging - experience, but I couldn't have done it without the skills of Demecina Gray, Contemporary Arts Center Gallery Assistant, and the great crew of dedicated volunteers. And most importantly, all the participating performers and video artists who made this such a memorable event.
At the festival opening party on Friday night at Emergency Arts. Multiplexer launched the Intercept 5:7 video program and 5th Wall Gallery featured Jevijoe Vitug's now-titled installation, along with the Nuclear Weapons Testing Legacy: A Tale of Two Cultures project.
And shown here at the weekend events at the CAC are performing artists Miguel Rodriguez, Artist Michael Barrett, Lou Lou Roxy, Amanda Haymond, Aaron Nemec, visiting Polish film maker Slawomir J. Milewski, and Justin Favela at the satellite venue The Mini Market.