During Basel Week, which just concluded on Sunday, December 8, the international art world took over Miami — from the huge tents on the beach that housed art fairs like Scope and Aqua to the innumerable murals, performance art pieces, after parties and gallery openings that spring up every year around the main fair, Art Basel Miami Beach. While we gave you a recap of Art Basel Miami Beach last week, today we bring you the best of what we saw at Context and Aqua, Kenny Scharf’s garden and mural installation, “Tony’s Oasis” (where we were able to speak to the artist as he chopped coconuts with a machete) as well as the female-focused “Women on the Walls” exhibition, which spotlighted the prominent female street artists in the mural project Wynwood Walls (covered here.)
Housed in a hotel in Miami Beach, Aqua boasted a huge offering of Pop Surrealist and New Contemporary art. Among the younger artists were heavy-hitting painters such as Travis Louie, who exhibited with William Baczek Fine Arts, and Gary Baseman, who recreated his recent birch tree installation from Shulamit Gallery in their booth. Context, which was not too far from the street art action in Miami’s Wynwood neighborhood, had a more modernist vibe. We discovered the spiky ceramic creatures of Myung Nam An, zeroed in on the tiny sculptures of Diem Chau and peered at the complex graffiti assemblages of Revok.
After Context, we hopped over to Wynwood to check out the “Women on the Walls” exhibition, which featured recent work from the likes of Maya Hayuk, Swoon and Miss Van and installations by Olek and Dabs Myla. Near the gallery, Olek took part in a yoga performance, dressing an athletic man in her signature hot pink, crocheted, camouflage suit as he twisted and wound his limbs for the cameras. Later, we cruised to the dedication ceremony of “Tony’s Oasis,” Kenny Scharf’s outdoor installation that included a garden planted by the artist, two murals hidden among the palm trees and a black-lit assemblage inside a bus. Stay tuned for part two of our recap of Basel Week, coming up tomorrow.
AQUA:
Gary Baseman for Shulamit Gallery
Travis Louie for William Baczek Fine Arts
Edward del Rosario for Rice Polak Gallery
Ryan Heshka for Antonio Colombo Arte Contemporanea
Clayton Brothers for Antonio Colombo Arte Contemporanea
Demitra Coupolos for Portrait Society Gallery
CONTEXT:
Ryan Martin for Mark Wolfe Contemporary Art
Richard Stipl for Galeria Enrique Guerrero
Revok for Library Street Collective
Paul Rousso for Cheryl Hazan Contemporary Art
Myung Nam An for Cube Gallery
Matthew Cox for Pentimenti
Diem Chau for Packer Schopf Gallery
Renee McGinnis for Packer Schopf Gallery
Lucong for Gallery Henoch
Anke Eilergerhard for Schmalfuss Berlin
Women on the Walls, Wynwood:
Swoon
Olek
Miss Van
Maya Hayuk
Faith47
Dabs Myla
Olek
Yogi wearing Olek’s crocheted suit
Olek and her performer
Kenny Scharf’s “Tony’s Oasis”:
Kenny Scharf with members of the Goldman family
