Art Basel Miami Beach 2015 has announced the artist’s names that will transform Collins Park, near the Bass Museum in December. Nicholas Baume, Director and Chief Curator of Public Art Fund will return for his third year curating the show’s Public sector. Under the theme ‘Metaforms’, 27 large-scale and site-specific installations and performances by leading and emerging artists from over 11 countries who will turn the park into an outdoor exhibition space. Produced in collaboration with the Bass Museum of Art for the fifth consecutive year, the sector will include significant works by Olaf Breuning, James Capper, Tony Cragg, Melvin Edwards, Sam Falls, Sylvie Fleury, Katharina Grosse, Matt Johnson, Jacob Kassay, Kris Martin, Rubén Ortiz Torres, Athena Papadopoulos, Ishmael Randall-Weeks, Sterling Ruby, Michael Sailstorfer, Tomás Saraceno, Tony Tasset, Rirkrit Tiravanija, Francisco Ugarte, Timm Ulrichs, Marianne Vitale, Ursula von Ryding svard, H ank Willis Thomas, Robert Wilson, Yan Xing and Xiao Yu.
The Public sector of Art Basel, whose Lead Partner is UBS, will open on Wednesday, December 2, with a special evening performance program featuring Xavier Cha (b.1980, United States), Ryan Gander (b. 1975, United Kingdom), Pope.L (b. 1955, United States) and Yan Xing (b. 1986, China).
Art Basel in Miami Beach’s Conversations series will open on Thursday morning with the Premiere Artist Talk, featuring artistsTrevor Paglen and Jenny Holzer. Paglen, who is known for layered explorations of contemporary themes of surveillance and covert governmental or corporate activity, and Holzer, who utilizes the rhetoric of modern information systems to address the politics of discourse, will consider questions of perception, language, and control.
On Friday, for the latest installment of his ongoing series on the diversity of artistic practice, Hans Ulrich Obrist, Co-director, Serpentine Gallery, London, will lead a panel considering ‘The Artist as Slow Traveler’. The talk will consider several artists whose practices relate to travel and mobility, including Shilpa Gupta, Paulo Nazareth, Stephen Shore, Shahzia Sikander, and Samson Young.
Conversations will continue on Saturday with a panel from Art Basel’s Public/Private series, entitled ‘Should Art Schools Prepare Artists for the Art World?’ Moderated by author and cultural consultant András Szántó, the discussion will consider the role of an art school education in today’s highly professionalized art world, by bringing together Sanford Biggers, Artist and Associate Professor of Visual Arts, Columbia University, New York; Nicolas Bourriaud, Curator and Art Critic, Paris; Howard Singerman, Phyllis and Joseph Caroff Chair of Art and Art History, Hunter College, City University of New York, and Rosanne Somerson, President, Rhode Island School of Design, Providence.
The series closes on Sunday with a conversation between artist Nicole Eisenman, winner of a 2015 MacArthur ‘Genius Grant’, and her gallerist Susanne Vielmetter, Owner and Director of Susanne Vielmetter Los Angeles Projects, on the special relationship between the artist and her gallerist.
Highlights of the afternoon Salon program, an open platform for short presentations, will include ‘New Role for Art in Cuba’, featuring Stéphane Aquin, Chief Curator, Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, Washington and the artist Carlos Garaicoa, moderated by Iliana Cepero Amador, Art Historian, Curator and Adjunct Professor, The New School and New York University. Continuing the discourse about art scenes in South America, the Mexican artist Pedro Friedeberg will be in conversation with the Colombian artist Beatriz González. On Friday, artist Rosalyn Drexler will take part in a dialogue with Katy Siegel, Thaw Professor, Stony Brook University, New York.
On Saturday, Salon continues with a discussion on sound works featuring the artists Mariele Neudecker, Camille Norment, Sophie Alsbo, and Alice Jacobs, and led by David Gryn, Curator of Art Basel’s Film sector and Founder of Daata Editions and Artprojx, London. Moderated by Andrew Goldstein, Chief Digital Content Officer, Phaidon/Artspace, New York, the Chairman ofRichard L. Feigen & Co., Richard L. Feigen, and the Owner of JTT, New York, Jasmin T. Tsou, will consider ‘The New Old Masters’.
Also of note will be ‘Transgender goes Mainstream’ with David J. Getsy, Goldabelle McComb Finn Distinguished Professor of Art History, Interim Dean of Graduate Studies, The School of the Art Institute of Chicago; the artist Gordon Hall; and Kimberly Drew, Founder, Black Contemporary Art, New York, moderated by William J. Simmons, Ph.D. Student, Art History and Women’s Studies, CUNY Graduate Center, New York.
Omar Kholeif, Manilow Senior Curator, Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago; Maryam Eisler, Co-chair, Middle East Acquisitions Committee, Tate, London; Yasser Akkaoui, Editor-in-chief, Executive Magazine, Beirut; and writer and Art Critic Arie Amaya-Akkermans, will discuss ‘Collecting as a Political Act’. Sarah Douglas, Editor-In-Chief, ARTnews Magazine, will moderate ‘The Ethics of Art Advising’ with Wendy Cromwell, Independent Art Advisor, Founder Cromwell Art LLC, New York; Jo Backer Laird, Patterson Belknap Webb & Tyler, New York; Jill Kraus, Art Collector, New York and Mary Sabbatino, Vice President and Partner, Galerie Lelong, New York.
As part of the Salon talks Nicholas Baume, Curator of Art Basel’s Public sector and Director and Chief Curator of Public Art Fund, New York, will speak with artists Ishmael Randall-Weeks, Hank Willis Thomas and Xavier Cha. Philippe Vergne, Director, The Museum of Contemporary Art, Los Angeles; Daniel McClean, Head of Art and Cultural Property Law, Howard Kennedy LLP, London; and artist Matt Johnson consider the phenomenon of artists donations in a panel moderated by Roland J. Augustine, Partner, Luhring Augustine Gallery, New York. Artist Tony Oursler, Beatrix Ruf, Director, Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam and Tom Eccles, Executive Director, Center for Curatorial Studies, Bard College, New York to discuss the contemporary role of the archive. The evolution of Los Ange les’ art scene will be at the heart of a conversation between artist Alex Israel and the author Bret Easton Ellis, moderated by Hans Ulrich Obrist.
The Salon program will then end on Sunday with ‘What-Profit: Hybrid Art Spaces’, featuring Stefan Benchoam, Artist and exhibition maker, Co-Founder and co-director of NuMu and Proyectos Ultravioleta, Guatemala City; Gabriela Saenz, General Director, TEOR/ética, San José, Costa Rica; Prem Krishnamurthy, Designer and Curator, Founder of Project Projects and P!, New York; and Chris Sharp, Writer, independent curator, and Co-Founder of Lulu, Mexico City, moderated by Mari Spirito, Founding Director of Protocinema, Istanbul/New York.