Updated: One Giant Art Basel Artifact Finds a Good Home
​
Updated: I received an awful lot of e-mails from interested people, but it looks like it will go to the first to contact me: Nelson from Urban Real Estate in the Warehouse Distrrict. Thanks for playing!
For Art Basel, Brooklyn photographers James and Karla Murray brought to Miami an awesome concept that included recruiting talented graffiti artists to do their thing on to-scale photos of extinct old-school storefronts.
The art hordes have evacuated our city, but one artifact remains from the Murrays' "Graffiti Gone Global" show: a 12-by-8-foot "storefront," pictured above, adorned with original artwork from Japanese artist Shiro, Puerto Rican Sofia Maldonado, and New Yorker Billi Kid. The piece is still inside a showroom at 3252 NE First St. in midtown Miami -- but the showroom's owners have told the Murrays it has to be removed by the end of the week or it will be destroyed. The photographers haven't found anybody who can take the massive artwork.
Highlights from Scope Art Fair 2009
![]() |
| Géza Szöllősi Cow II |
Highlights From Pulse Art Fair 2009
![]() |
| This work was made entirely of split color pencils. |
![]() |
| Mac Premo's Making Stuff Is Totally Gay |
Basel Brought The Box to Nikki Beach
We'd already seen a similar Big Apple show in Spiegelworld, and being such a huge hit, it wasn't a huge surprise that The Box was one of the most buzzed-about nightlife events of Basel. Buzz because of the promised taboo nature of the performances (burlesque, aerialists, contortionists, etc), but just as much chatter because of the steep $100 general admission. I guess raunch knows no recession. Hell, I know raunch knows no recession because people packed Nikki Beach for The Box's entire three-day run.
Highlights From Art Basel Miami Beach 2009: Part 2
![]() |
| Dan Attoe's I'm Stealing Your ideas at Peres Projects |
After part one, here are a few more of our favorites from Art Basel Miami Beach 2009.
![]() |
| Cordon Cheung, Neon Shadows, 2009 at Jack Shainman Gallery |
Miami-Dade Cops Nab Million-Dollar Art Thief in the Midst of Art Basel
| via Miami-Dade Police Department |
| One of the stolen paintings, by Albert Gleizes (1914), valued at $1.4 million, according to police. |
Miami-Dade Police have arrested a local man accused of stealing millions of dollars in paintings at gunpoint Tuesday -- but they have yet to track down the missing artwork.
| via Miami-Dade Police Department |
| The suspect, Jorge Alberto Gonzalez. |
Here's how it went down:
On Monday, Gonzalez made contact with a local art owner named Jorge Zaragozi and his dealer, Gustavo Grande Nuñez.
Nuñez showed Gonzalez a large collection of paintings and negotiated the sale of ten pieces for $985,000 -- including the painting by Albert Gleizes pictured above, which is valued at $1.4 million, says Det. Rebecca Perez, a Miami-Dade Police spokeswoman.
The two men met again, on December 1 around 1 p.m., and loaded the paintings into Gonzalez's car. The plan was to drive to his office, where he'd pay Nuñez for the artwork.
Highlights From Art Basel 2009: Part 1
![]() |
| Nick Cave Soundsuit, 200 at Jack Shainman Gallery |
It would be futile to pick some sort of narrative to string everything together, so instead we'll highlight a few of our favorites this week.
Iggy Pop Needs A Manssiere
![]() |
| Francisco Alvarado |
| Iggy Pop's man boobs attract a crowd. |
From there skipped east to 412 Lincoln Road to Miguel Paredes The Manifestation of Cross-Over Art, but didn't even try to go in upon seeing a velvet rope and a couple of gate keepers with clipboards. Sorry, but I'm not about to do the guest list ritual for a storefront next to a Starbucks.
So I hit the Julia Tuttle Causeway and crossed over to the mainland to oogle the hipsterati drinking, smoking, hobnobbing and chillaxing over at Our House West Of Wynwood to check out the Max Fish, David Lynch and the It Ain't Fair exhibitions.
Scope Miami Still Local Friendly As Ever
![]() |
| Photo by Ian Witlen |
| Work by Miami's Jen Stark. Click here to view more photos from this slideshow. |
In this year's catalog, [former] Miami Mayor Manny Diaz welcomes the fair right up front. In addition, local galleries Arune 5 Art, Hardcore Art Contemporary Space, Gallery Diet and Carol Jazzar Contemporary Art were invited to exhibit. Add to that the return Karelle Levy's Krel 2 Go and locally driven performance space, Sweatshoppe, and market, Covet Garden, and it becomes clear the city is represented.
Last Night: David Lynch's 'Dark Night of the Soul' At OHWOW
| Photo by Tim Elfrink |
The director's tightrope walk between macabre and mundane was plastered all over the walls of OHWOW last night in a show that, shockingly, was Lynchian to the max.
Eerily lit young women bled into tightly trimmed suburban grass. Smartly dressed '50s family units gathered around a Thanksgiving table serving a giant, terrified man's head. Men in tighty whities fled police officers armed with garden hoses.
The impossible to purchase collaboration between Danger Mouse and Sparklehorse -- called "Dark Night of the Soul," like the show -- only added to the Blue Velvet-aping feeling of unease. With guest vocals from the Flaming Lips and Frank Black, the tunes often struck a discordantly upbeat tone.
Click through for more photos from the show and OHWOW's other It Ain't Fair exhibits -- featuring the likes of Neck Face, Agathe Snow, and Julia Chang.
Silicon Beach: Art Basel Gets Buzzing on Twitter
![]() |
| Art Log Live is a social site, bringing Art Basel to you one tweet at time. |
The main hashtag is #artbasel, which appears in a search window. Follow it and you can be in two places at once, at least virtually. Hopefully people will tweet insider dirt from the ultra exclusive parties for the benefit of the riff-raff who can't afford paintings or cover charges.
Folks who don't Twitter can contribute to the buzz by sending text messages to 41411.
Though not a work of art, a hashtag is a thing of social media beauty. Being able to follow conversations about Art Basel on Twitter could lead to some networking among art lovers who haven't yet met in real life. If you're an armchair art enthusiast, you'll know, at the very least, who's saying what about Art Basel without actually having to schlep anywhere.And you might even make a decision about attending an event based on Twitter.
Video: Design Miami/ With OK Go and Maarten Baas
Consider this the video counterpart to yesterday's review of Design Miami/ 2009. We still recommend you head out for yourself, but in the meantime enjoy OK Go's laser guitar performance, designer Maarten Baas's human-powered clockwork (that's the man himself opening the cabinet), and other assorted bits of fancy from the fair through the power of FlipCam and YouTube.
Michael Jackson: King of Art Basel
Of course, it wasn't the only Michael Jackson piece at the fair. Yvon Lambert also presented two works, Gold Bubbles and Silver Bubbles, by artist Jonathan Monk. (That picture is after the jump.) Plus we wouldn't be too surprised if we saw more Jackson-inspired artwork at the satellite fairs.
We'll have the rest of our initial perception of Basel up in the morning. We're understandably exhausted at the moment.
Highlights From Design Miami/ 2009
![]() |
| All photos by Ian Witlen. Check out the full slideshow here. |
This year's designer of the year, Maarten Baas, steals the show. It's not often a spoiler alert can be applied to a design fair, but if you don't want ruined the whimsy of coming across some of his creations, perhaps skip to the next paragraph. Though there are pieces from many of his trademark furniture series on display, the highlight is his ongoing work with clocks. Baas keeps not one but two people locked in cabinets. Each one has the duty of manually changing the time on a clock, one digital, one analog. One side of the cabinet shows the timepiece, while the other side features a porthole through which spectators can watch the timekeeper at work.
Video: Art Basel Miami 2009 Shepard Fairey Hitting Wall in Wynwood and Street Art Interview
The video above is of Shepard Fairey and his team of glue techs hanging posters last night around 8 for the Wynwood Walls public street art exhibition, next to Joey's Wynwood Modern Italian Café on NW Second Avenue between 25th and 27th streets. The Fairey piece deals with human rights and standing up for them.
Here are some sneak-preview images of some of the other walls that are part of the project in progress.
Tired of Art Basel? Five Suggestions for a Culture-less Weekend Getaway!
![]() |
So listen, if you live in the South Beach or the Wynwood/Design District/Midtown areas and are sick of pretending you know the difference between a Rauschenberg and a Rosenquist for one week a year, then get out! Get out! Get out while you still can!
Seriously. Put your place up for rent for the week on Craigslist. Some desperate soul will pay enough to finance your getaway, then get yourself, and more importantly your car out of here.
Luckily our esteemed Riptide travel department has come up with five suggestion of where you should go. Keep in mind these suggestions also work perfectly for New Year's Eve, Urban Beach Week and Winter Music Conference:
![]() |
Chances are if you live in an area affected by Basel-itis you haven't been to any of South Florida's fine suburbs in years. There are wonderful, beautiful places like Cutler Bay, Palmetto Estates, Goulds, Kendall, Kendall West and Kendale Lakes! Truth be told Riptide isn't sure what's out there. Probably some Wal-Marts ...we went to a Steak'n'Shake somewhere out there once. That was pretty good. We've even heard rumors that there's such a thing as "free parking."
![]() |
This suggestion goes out to our South Beach pals especially. Yes you. We saw you recently. You probably don't remember. You were so wasted they wouldn't even let you into Club Deuce. You were heading home with someone we're pretty sure isn't your preferred sex. And he looked like the age of soomeone with a medicine chest full of Medicare-supplied goodies in pill form. Maybe that was the reason. Maybe check into a detox for a few days. Work out a few of your personal problems (we're sure your dad actually loved you, he probably just didn't know how to show it). And be back in time to have a very sober New Year.
Director David Lynch Exposes His Dark Soul at O.H.W.O.W.
![]() |
| Courtesy of David Lynch/O.H.W.O.W. |
Also known for his quirky collaborations with actors, the iconoclastic auteur recently teamed up with sonic visionary Danger Mouse and rock recluse Sparkehorse for a project called "Dark Night of the Soul."
Their groundbreaking union has resulted in a full-length album and illustrated book with hypnotic photographs by Lynch, over 50 of which will be on view next week during Art Basel at local alt haunt, O.H.W.O.W. (3100 NW 7th Avenue, Miami).
The exhibition opens with a reception Wednesday, December 2, at 8 p.m. and Lynch's haunting imagery will be amped up by the accompanying soundtrack which also includes vocals from Flaming Lips, Julian Casablancas of The Strokes, Frank Black of the Pixies, Iggy Pop, Nina Persson of The Cardigans, Suzanne Vega and many others.

Seven limited edition prints of each of Lynch's photographs will be available for purchase.
Workshop Workshop Makes Zines Inside Design Miami
![]() |
| Jim Drain |
Workshop Workshop, a factory and salon created by artist Jim Drain, poet P. Scott Cunningham, and sculptor Graham Hudson, produces zines that respond to Design/Miami itself--its participants, objects, conversations, histories, narratives, suggestions and shapes. Even the detritus of the tent's construction has been put to use by Hudson, who is in the act of constructing the space using leftover lumber, rubber, plastic, furniture--anything the fair and the city (the larger fair) has cast off. In Workshop Workshop, physical and metaphysical byproducts are recycled and put to use, creating an environment, a process, and a series of work that represents the heightened interplay that occurs in Miami each December, and creates a locus for collaboration.
Drain, Cunningham and Hudson will draw from a rotating--and ever-expanding--crew of local and international artists, designers and writers, in order to produce as many zines as it can during the length of fair, with as diverse a range of content as possible.
zine [zeen]
1. An abbreviation of the word fanzine, or magazine
2. A handmade journal, with small circulations and hyperlocal aesthetics, that maximizes the two-dimensional intersection of image and text, using both original and appropriated content.
3. Any self-published work of minority interest reproduced via photocopier.
Completed zines cost $5.00 each or can be bartered for intellectual property.
Proceeds will be donated to two local non-profits, Bas Fisher Invitational, an artist-run exhibition space, and the University of Wynwood, a literature advocacy organization.
Get Your Own Work of Art into Basel
Being one of the premiere art festivals of the year, not just any Joe Blow can show during Art Basel. You'd need connections, talent, or...a pack of markers, a glue gun, and some stray sequins. This year, the Scope Art Show has opened up their grand ol' doors to the OMNI Board of Tourism and invited them to invite you to design a bit of something to appear on their giant T-Shirt Wall. As a part of Covet Garden -- a marketplace of handmade goods, books, and live projects curated by Daria Brit Shapiro, Karelle Levy, and Andrew Lockhart -- the wall allows space for 100 one-of-a-kind shirts that show off style, Miami pride, or whatever the hell you want it to.
Your Basel Guide to Basel Guides
Click here for music and parties.
Here for alllll the galleries, festivals, and free wine fests.
And here for a frequently updated resource of breaking news, even more events, and exclusive interviews.
There's no way that you'll get to them all, so check back with us after it's all over for recaps and slideshows that'll make you regret getting blazed and couch surfing the entire weekend, bro.
Art Burn 09 Plans to Set Wynwood on Fire
| Photo by David Castor |
"ART BURN, the most combustible art show in the world, will combine an international selection of original art with fire. Original works on canvas, wood and paper by a selection of more than three dozen international artists will be displayed and then flambeed in Miami on the evening of Thursday, December 3, 2009 at sunset. The exhibition/grilling, curated by NYC artist El Celso, will take place in the Wynwood Arts District, within walking distance of Miami's lesser contemporary art fairs. An exclusive selection of more than three dozen exceptional pieces by the hottest renowned artists and sizzling, cutting-edge newcomers will be displayed from 1pm until sundown. After the brief exhibition, all of these original works will be burned for the public's viewing pleasure. Nothing is for sale."
Kingsford charcoal is even listed as an event sponsor. (Once you latch onto a theme, take all the way to the end.) Read another write-up of it here.
Not sure how good the art will be, but at the very least, I've had this same idea walking through some of the tent fairs in recent years. Bring your marshmellows and Britto sketches.
Czech War Photographs at the Freedom Tower
![]() |
| Koudelka used a by-stander's watch to document the exact time Soviet forces invaded |
Put together by Miami-Dade College and the Aperture Foundation in New York, Invasion 68 Prague is an exhibition of the photography of Josef Koudelka, who documented the 1968 invasion of Prague by Soviet and Warsaw Pact forces. The roughly sixty images capture the street-level perspective of a key moment in the 20th Century and many of them have never been exhibited before. More important than some collage by a kid who just graduated art school? Yeah, probably.
The opening reception is Tuesday, December 1 at 6 - 8 p.m. on the first floor at the Freedom Tower. The exhibition runs until February 6, 2010.
The Black Factory, Rhinestone Deer, Giant 'No' on a Truck to be on Public Display Next Week
![]() |
| via Perofrma |
Mondrian's Luxe Vending Machine Getting Restocked In Time for Art Basel
![]() |
Friends With You Set to Open Boutique: How Long Until They Overtake Britto as Miami's Signature Artist?
![]() |
Their new brick and mortar outpost, to be located at 3930 NE 2nd Avenue Suite 202, is scheduled to open Tuesday, December 1, during Art Basel week with a host of brand new limited edition products, including clothes, toys, prints, and fine art. Sam and Tury themselves will be on hand for a signing at 6pm, and all attendees will receive a free Super Malfi with purchase of any other product.
Riptide is super excited to see FWY further stake their claim as an artsy force to be reckoned with in the Magic City, and can only hope one day they overtake the dark overlord Britto as Miami's signature artist. They've already installed the playground at Aventura Mall, but seriously how great would it be to see a giant Malfi outside of some shopping center instead of another Britto sculpture of a beach ball? How many of those do we really need? And maybe they could even re-design the uniforms at M.I.A. Natacha Seijas' maid would be lucky to wear some Friends With You.
Lance Armstrong Recruits 25 Top Artists for Benefit Show
![]() |
| KAWS, The End |
No More Big Orange Containers of Wonderfulness at Art Basel
![]() |
| Logan Fazio |
| You never knew what would pop out of those containers. |
As part of a reorganization of the fair, the emerging galleries and artists relegated to Collins Park this year will be moved to the center of the exhibition hall. Instead, the Art Positions area will feature a "three-dimensional environment" designed by multimedia artist Pae White. The so-called social space will feature discussions, concerts, and performances.
Art Positions, especially on opening night, has more of a party atmosphere than the often deathly serious mood at the convention center. Combined with the unique aspects of showing inside a container, it often led to a bit more levity that might be overshadowed inside the convention center.
The fair's main layout in the Miami Beach Convention Center will also be reworked, and galleries will now have larger booths. You might take that to mean there will be fewer galleries in attendance, and in fact about 60 of last year's exhibitors won't make the return trip. But Art Basel officials tell ARTINFO the number of exhibitors will actually increase due to new galleries participating.
Design Miami Names Maarten Baas Designer of the Year
![]() |
Design Miami Wants Europe to Shut Up; Looking for Emerging American Designers
![]() |
| F**k yeah! |





Post a Comment

































