All In a Week’s Worth of Art – Knight Foundation
Arts

All In a Week’s Worth of Art

March in Miami is never idle. What with the Miami International Film Festival, the Winter Music Conference, and the peak of the performance season, it used to be hard for visual arts to get a view in edgewise. Not anymore. Openings, one-off events, readings, and even …

a fair vie for equal time this week.

Like on Wednesday evening, when  “Aesthetics & Values” opened at The Patricia & Phillip Frost Museum, a great collaboration of some of Miami’s most exciting artists and students from FIU’s Honor College.

The students pick out their favorite artists, and then curate a show — “they sold empanadas, organized blood drives, and secured corporate sponsorship” to realize their dream, according to organizer and professor, John Bailly, about the fifth installment of this yearly exhibit. Students, parents, faculty, and art interlopers all checked out the works of familiar names Bhakti Baxter, Xavier Cortada, Guerra de la Paz, Richard Haden, Bert Rodriguez, Gerry Stecca, TM Sisters, Frances Trombly, Wendy Wischer, and Ricardo E. Zulueta.

Wischer’s lotus-like sculpture covered in mirrored tiles, with light reflecting and dancing off it, was one favorite; the TM Sisters delivered in a funky digital performance; and once again the duo of Guerra de la Paz created a site-specific installation of unique intensity, made from found cloth, this time in dark colors and vaguely forbidding.

On Thursday night the first six artists who will take part in the live/work residency of LegalArt (through a Knight Foundation grant) introduced themselves in a reception at the Rubell Collection, as the space they will inhabit — four floors worth — is not quite ready, downtown, across from CIFO. The artists will collaborate and share baths and meals, but part of the the deal is that they also work with the community in programs they originate. It’s a year-long residency, and a cool experiment for Miami.

On the same night over at the spanking new de la Cruz Collection in the Design District, another project possible through a Knight grant was also on display. [Name] Publications, founded by Gean Moreno, held a fundraiser for the local art books it publishes, with works in multiples donated by 10 artists for sale, and a performance from local collaborative Psychic Youth, Inc.

Tomorrow, ready yourself for one of Miami’s most imaginative performance artists, when David Rohn arrives in his own multiples at the Carol Jazzar Gallery, for “In Characters.” On opening night, and then on closing day in a month, various characters will appear, be it The Revolutionary, The Muslim Woman, The Senator, The Curator — six in all will be unveiled during the exhibit, while his photography will be in the main gallery throughout.

And if that’s not enough, one of the biggest fairs for Latin art opens today, arteamericas, which takes over the Miami Beach Convention Center featuring over 40 international galleries through the weekend. “Aesthetics & Values” at the Frost Art Museum FIU; 10975 SW 17th St., Miami; through April 18. “In Characters” at the Carol Jazzar Gallery; 158 NW 91st St., Miami; 305-490-6906; closing performance April 11. Arteamericas Latin art fair, Miami Beach Convention Center, 1901 Convention Center Dr., March 26-29.