Art Basel Miami Beach 2009 Art Show Opens

From December 3 through 6, 2009, Miami Beach, Florida, will be home to the 8th edition of Art Basel Miami Beach, the international art show. More than 250 leading galleries from North America, Europe, Latin America, Asia and Africa will take part. Chosen by renowned gallerists of the Art Basel Miami Beach Selection Committee, the galleries will show works by more than 2,000 artists of the 20th and 21st centuries. Special sectors are devoted to very recent artworks, curated exhibits, perfor-mance, and art in public spaces. This year, the layout of Art Basel Miami Beach will be extensively redesigned, including larger spaces for many galleries, and an innovative floorplan to improve the visitor experience inside the Miami Beach Convention Center.

Occurring annually since its launch in 2002, Art Basel Miami Beach 2009 will run from December 3 through December 6, 2009. Galleries selected from 33 countries will be showcasing paintings, drawings, sculptures, installations, photography, editions, and videos. The show’s list of participants makes Art Basel Miami Beach the most prestigious art show of the Americas, featuring highly established galleries and many dynamic newcomers. Prices range from a few hundred dollars, for multiples and works by young artists, to several million for museum-quality masterpieces. Many major US museums are organizing trips to Florida, and numerous groups of art collectors from Latin America and Europe have already announced their visits. During the show’s five-day run, more than 40,000 art lovers are expected to visit the international art show.

Art Galleries sector
The Selection Committee – comprised of 12 renowned international gallerists – has picked more than 180 galleries for this year’s show. Roughly half of the exhibitors come from out-side the United States, with strong participation from Europe and Latin America, plus 11 galleries from Asia and two from Africa.

Art Kabinett sector
Art Kabinett gives 28 galleries participating in the Art Galleries sector an opportunity to present small curated exhibitions, in a separately delineated space within the gallery’s booth. The exhibition concepts for Art Kabinett are diverse, including thematic group exhibitions, art-historical solo shows and showcases for rising stars. This year’s projects feature a wide array of artists, ranging from emerging artists such as Jakub Julian Ziotkowski, Haegue Yang and Latifa Echakhch to historical figures like Marcel Duchamp, George Grosz and Jack Tworkov. Further highlights include projects by Olafur Eliasson, Anish Kapoor, Richard Prince and Wim Delvoye. Group shows include exhibitions titled “Ninety Years of Bauhaus and “Aspects of Pop Art.

Art Nova sector
In this year’s Art Nova sector, 64 emerging and established galleries from 24 countries are presenting new works, by a maximum of three artists. Recent pieces by more than 130 artists will be on display, providing visitors an opportunity for discovering pieces fresh from studios around the globe – and making the sector an ideal place to spot the newest tendencies in artistic production. This year’s presentations include 17 solo shows, featuring artists such as Marc Bijl, Valie Export, Rashid Rana, Dan Attoe, Michael Beutler, Monir Shahroudy Farmanfarmaian, Jose Dávila and Marine Hugonnier.

Art Positions sector
Formerly located at Collins Park, Art Positions will now be situated in the center of the exhibition halls surrounding the central cube. The sector presents 23 young galleries from nine different countries, showcasing cutting-edge projects by single artists or conceptual group shows, featuring works by artists such as Renate Lorenz, Falke Pisano, Ulla von Brandenburg, Agathe Snow, Egill Saebjornsson, Reena Spaulings and Marcel Broodthaers.

Art Projects
Art Projects, this year curated for the first time by Patrick Charpenel of Guadalajara, Mexico, features projects by internationally renowned artists such as Santiago Sierra, Claire Fontaine, William Pope.L, Rirkrit Tiravanija, and Franz West. Selected from propos-als by the galleries of Art Basel Miami Beach, they are installed in the outdoor public spaces of Miami Beach, within close proximity to Oceanfront area and the Miami Beach Convention Center. These works engage directly with the spectator, interrupting the daily routine of passersby in poetic and surprising ways.

The Oceanfront
The Oceanfront area, formerly home to Art Positions, has been created as a platform for virtually all of Art Basel Miami Beach’s cultural programming. Situated directly on the beach, the Oceanfront marks the point where the artworld interfaces with the broader pub-lic. We are delighted to have Creative Time, the legendary New York City-based public art organization, as a partner in the launching of this new dimension of Art Basel Miami Beach. Together with Art Basel Miami Beach, Creative Time commissioned Los Angeles artist Pae White to design the central element of this space.

Art Video
Curated by Creative Time Art Video will involve screenings of videos by Tom Sachs and The Neistat Brothers, Marc Horowitz, Jill Magid, and Kon Trubkovich, followed by discussions with the artists. The program will take place on Thursday and Saturday from 7 – 8.30 pm during the show.

Art Perform
Based at the Oceanfront, Art Perform now features an intensified program of longer per-formances by rising international artists. As in former years, this program will be curated by Jens Hoffmann, director of the CCA Wattis Institute, San Francisco. It will take place on Thursday and Saturday at 9 p.m. and feature performances by Kelly Nipper, Kris Martin, Simon Fujiwara, Claire Fontaine, and Mario Garcia Torres / Loris Gréaud.

Art Film
This year’s Art Film event offers an exclusive work-in-progress sneak preview of the fea-ture length documentary film “Jean-Michel Basquiat: The Radiant Child, preceded by a panel with a selection of the film’s participants, moderated by Bob Colacello. “Jean-Michel Basquiat: The Radiant Child is directed by Tamra Davis and features a long and never-before-seen interview with Jean-Michel Basquiat (1960-1988), shot shortly before his death. Art Film is curated by Zurich film connaisseur This Brunner.

Museums and Private Collections
Once again, Miami’s leading private collections – among them the Margulies Collection, the Rubell Family Collection, CIFO, the de la Cruz Collection, the Mora Collection, the Scholl Collection, and the Dacra Collection – will be opening their homes and warehouses to guests of the international art show. The museums of South Florida, too, will be staging important exhibitions to coincide with Art Basel Miami Beach, including exhibitions presenting Guillermo Kuitca at the Miami Art Museum, “Art from the Jumex Collection” at the Bass Museum, William Kentridge at the Norton Museum, George Segal at the Margulies Collection, “The Realms of Realityˮ at MOCA Miami, and Raymond Pettibon and Sylvie Fleury at World Class Boxing.