It’s a city that continually challenges and frustrates expectations. For the local art lovers and artists, and for visitors, too, this is a pretty wonderful thing. Confounded expectations usually translate to delightful surprises, and this makes for a rather lively citiscape that is continually evolving, revealing new, hidden sides moment to moment. This was perhaps best exemplified in the recent Primary Flight exhibit at the Art Basel showcase last winter.
Art Basel Miami Beach typically brings in a lot of the heavy hitters in the art world, including artists, exhibitors, curators, art critics, and collectors alike. The international art community at large turns its eye on the city, where international connections are established and firmed up, and some of the most interesting works of contemporary art get shown in the city. It’s a particularly good time for the hospitality industry, as visitors get to take advantage of Miami’s lovely accommodations , and enjoy all that the city has to offer. For some artists, particularly those whose work falls outside the established institutions, it’s an opportunity to make public displays that will attract the attention of the art world at large.
Primary Flight , in its third incarnation, is a way for outsider artists to make bold statements in a way that escapes the institutions. Interestingly enough, the last manifestation got the endorsements of some larger forces, notably Dr. Dre, and also gained the participation from some big names in the art world.
They create the largest public art installation in the world, by gathering the artists together to create, on their own time schedule, large murals that grace the streets. It’s graffiti art with a difference, and some of the most well-known taggers were involved. It’s been a fascinating evolution, the move from outsider status to public support that’s on the verge of seeming to be institutionally supported. However, it’s still based on rough forms and rough techniques, which are necessary to give these artists the breathing room to create as they wish. The results are surprising, and often confounding, revealing an uncertain sense that the walls of the institutions may not be speaking as loud as they think they are, and that the streets are still the place where ideas can be formed, and occasionally even realized.
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