All images courtesy Maccarone Gallery.

Currently on view at Maccarone New York is Hanna Liden‘s “Out of My Mind, Back in 5 Minutes.” The installation includes three photographs and several sculptures made from plastic shopping bags, t-shirts, and garbage bags. These items are stacked and filled with poured plaster or covered with latex, rendering them heavy and useless.

Loaded with references to memento mori and tribal customs, this process-based work transforms markers of the ephemerality and mundaneness of city life. It offers what the exhibition’s press release calls “a meditation on urbanity […] The result is a gallery space turned reliquary, containing the ghosts of an urban tribe now obsolete.”

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If one were to squeeze the last four years at Art Basel Miami Beach into a quick few words, it might read something like this: 2006 was good. 2007 was maniacally successful. 2008 was crash and burn. 2009 was a bit lackluster.  Considering the lingering gray economic climate, how would one describe the 9^th edition of the fair, year 2010? The general verdict was this year’s fair was strong and consistent, in terms of art, sales, and attendance.

The Gallerist Galerie Emmanuel Perrotin, Booth G7

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Another view of the main lobby, A Scott Campbell “tropical fantasy” (represented by the Miami based OHWOW Gallery) is the top center work

Art Observed was on site at the Soho Beach House Miami during the week of Art Basel Miami Beach for a tour of the 150 work art collection assembled for the private club and hotel.    Keeping a close connection with the artistic community has been an important part of the strategy for the Soho house brand, which has multiple locations in England as well as in New York and newly in Los Angeles, Berlin and Miami Beach.   This week marked the first Art Basel Miami Beach for the location and it hit the ground running,  hosting some important events such as dinners for White Cube and Victoria Miro galleries and a W Magazine event.

A John Baldessari on the left and a Friends With You on the right, in a hallway on the main floor

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AO vistited the Delano’s Florida Room where graffiti artist/nightlife curator André Sarraiva has set up his Art Basel Miami Beach residency of Le Baron, featuring a five-day series of parties coinciding with the Art Fair events. Le Baron hosts similar events in Art Basel in Switzerland and at the Venice Biennale.  Since 2005, the concept has been in Miami for the fair beginning at the karaoke club, Studio. The entrance policy is likely the toughest of any nightclub in Miami during the fair.  While the line built up outside the party picked up roughly after the MOCA sponsored LCD Soundsystem set finished at the Raleigh steps away and continued on until at least 4am.

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Art Observed was on site for the launch of the Aquariva Speedboat designed by Marc Newson at the Standard Hotel and Spa in Miami Beach.  This is the same speedboat exhibited at the Gagosian Gallery in New York in September.  Below is a photoset of of the event.

Andre Balazs

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