by Onajídé Shabaka - 20 June, 2007

  Art Around Town June 2007 (part 1)

    by Onajídé Shabaka

Wynwood and Design District openings took place in a slightly lower key than normal. With some galleries closed and off to Europe, we had a quieter than normal weekend. That has given me the opportunity to spend more time to work on the weekly projects assigned for Artist as an Entrepreneur Institute, a series of full-day sessions on four consecutive Saturdays, beginning June 2. That means that after a full day in a workshop beginning at 9 a.m., doing some networking then, I traveled to Miami to check out some art.

The Artist as an Entrepreneur Institute is an artist-focused course of study designed to assist all artists (visual, performing, literary) by cultivating and advancing their business skills: choosing a business structure, understanding clients, pricing your work, creating a communications strategy, raising capital, protecting your rights, accounting & bookkeeping, paying taxes, and finally, writing a business plan. It has been more than worth the time, effort and, cost if for no other reason to put things in proper focus.

In DamienB's slightly smaller exhibition spaces, were found some more work by Jon Davis. His boxes of optical devices, lights, photographs and transparent materials open little worlds of illusion that are sometimes very imaginative and other times dark and obscured. That does not mean the works are themselves dark and obscured in a way that prevents us from seeing it but, only the subject matter. (Davis' work is extremely difficult to photograph.)

Jon Davis

Kunsthaus Miami is sometimes frustrating to visit because I don't think they have explored their aesthetic possibilities as much as I think is possible. Maybe it's just I want to see more from a potentially great gallery. This month featured Sadko, paintings that are well done but, how about a few more pieces?

Sadko

In the Buena Vista building I ran into Tiffany Chestler, curator of the Dacra temporary spaces for artists. Together we walked and talked until reaching the photographs of Eddy Joseph, featuring images from the Caribbean. With a background in journalistic photography his series, "the Real Caribbean," we are given an up close view of the lives of the poor residents from a number of islands. The thing that keeps us out of the frame in viewing these works is the thing Joseph must do for his work and, that is, keep some editorial distance between himself and his subject. However good these images are, and they are good, I want more intimacy, I want to be right there were the rubber meets the road in the lives of the people he's bringing us. Maybe featuring more about the lives of some individuals in a series could have done that. As it is, I feel like I flew in, traveled about the island, went back to the airport and went home. Is that what he was looking for?

Eddy Joseph

Of course, with so many galleries and art spaces opening their doors, it becomes difficult to see every show every month. So, I have made more of an effort to visit some new places, even if you haven't read about it here. A decision to correct that silence is here this month with a mention to Undercurrent Arts. Although most of the artists they have shown up to now have been from out of the Miami area, I think it makes sense to have a mix of the two in order to get more people in the door.

[continued in part 2]

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