Detail from Nellie Appleby.

The artist-run downtown space Dimensions Variable has decided to throw a show across the causeway in collaboration with ArtCenter South Florida in the main Lincoln Road gallery, cleverly called “On Location.”

The three featured female artists, Nellie Appleby, Allison Matherly and Cristina Lei Rodriguez, all work with nature, or how we end up interacting and interpreting it.

For instance, the most prominent of the grouping, Lei Rodriguez, has always formed sculptures made from outrageous synthetics and baubles, in psychedelic colors, that at first seem to shout out the opposite of “natural.” But, in fact, she is often commenting on our very unnatural state down here in South Florida, living on top a swamp that constantly needs manipulating or our environment will collapse under the heat and humidity that we have never really tamed.

Appleby, in contrast, is an anthropologist and amateur botanist, whose work focuses in video and photography on actual plant life, most recently that of the flora of Colombia, where she was on a residency. She returns to Miami for this second DV show.

Matherly is based in Miami Beach – home, some would say, to the superficial and unnatural human creations. She plays with that in works that look like the real thing – a sculptural piece mimicking an element from nature, made entirely of man-made materials.

In October, the three artists behind DV, Leyden Rodriguez Casanova, Frances Trombly and Adler Guerrier, will set up their own works down the street at the 924 Lincoln Road space to continue “On Location.”

Part 1 of “On Location” opens Wed., Sept. 17 and runs through Nov. 2 at 800 Lincoln Rd., Miami Beach. Part 2 opens Oct. 8 and runs through Nov. 2 at 924 Lincoln Rd., Miami Beach; www.artcentersf.org.