MIAMI, FLA.- On Sunday, December 10,
Untitled, Miami Beach closed its sixth edition with reports of strong sales throughout the week and an enthusiastic response from participating galleries, collectors, museum professionals, artists and the general public. Untitled, Miami Beach held its position as a must-attend event amongst the many activities taking place during Miami Art Week, setting a record for attendance. The 2017 edition of the fair was led by Executive Director, Manuela Mozo in partnership with Artistic Director, Omar López-Chahoud.
The curated fair featured 137 galleries from 26 countries and 58 cities, resulting in a notably diverse and international presentation. The fair was pleased to welcome 41 new exhibitors including galleries from Cuba, Iran, Peru, Turkey, Uruguay and South Africa, as well as a continuing strong presence of galleries from Europe and Latin and North America.
Across six days, the fair attracted 39,000 visitors, the highest attendance in the fair’s history. Visitors included esteemed collectors from around the world such as Sarah Arison, Matthew Armstrong, Maria Baibakova, Estrellita Brodsky, JK Brown and Eric Diefenbach, Laura Lee Brown and Steve Wilson, Jeffrey Dauber, Zoë and Joel Dictrow, Larry Fields, Keith Fox and Tom Keyes, Bill Gautreaux, Kemal Has Cingillioglu, Susan and Michael Hort, Pamela Joyner, Jill and Peter Kraus, Dani Levinas, George Lindemann, Nion McEvoy, Misha and Anna Moeremans, Jorge Perez, Patricia Phelps de Cisneros, Ron Pizzuti, Beth Rudin DeWoody, Michael Ringier, Mera and Donald Rubell, Debra and Dennis Scholl, Bruce Toll, Robin Wright, and Anita Zabludowicz among others.
Leading curators and art world professionals were among the guests at the sixth edition of Untitled, Miami Beach, including Bill Arning (CAM Houston), Elysia Borowy (MCA Detroit), Amy Cappellazzo, Gary Carrion-Murayari (New Museum), Mary Ceruti (SculptureCenter), Cathleen Chaffee (Albright-Knox), Eric Crosby (Carnegie Museum of Art), Jose Esparza Chong Cuy (MCA Chicago), Michael Goodson (Wexner Center for the Arts), Rebecca Hart (Denver Art Museum), Max Hollein (Fine Arts Museums, San Francisco), Ruba Katrib (MoMA PS1), Philipp Kaiser, Omar Kholeif (MCA Chicago), Justine Ludwig (Dallas Contemporary), Lisa Melandri (CAM St Louis), Tobias Ostrander (Pérez Art Museum Miami), Adriano Pedrosa (Museu de Arte de São Paulo), Christian Rattemeyer (MoMA), Eva Respini (ICA Boston), Ellen Salpeter (ICA Miami), Kenny Schachter, Lisa Schiff, Hans-Ulrich Obrist (Serpentine Galleries), as well as notable guests such as artists and architects David Adjaye, Andrea Bowers, Chuck Close, Alex Katz, Paul Mpagi Sepuya, Amy Sherald, and Mickalene Thomas.
This year’s Untitled, Miami Beach was the first edition under the leadership of Executive Director Manuela Mozo, who commented: “I was extremely excited by my first edition of Untitled, Miami Beach as Executive Director. The support and enthusiasm from our exhibitors and partners made my transition from exhibitor to fair director a true pleasure. It is clear from the excellent and diverse presentations and record attendance figures this year that Untitled is maturing year on year, while retaining its unique curatorial identity. We are looking forward to an even better fair in 2018 and onward.”
Participating galleries expressed their enthusiasm for the sixth edition of Untitled, Miami Beach:
“Untitled is solidly on the Miami art fair week must-see list! Location, lighting, and a strong mix of global galleries with excellent programs makes Untitled, Miami Beach a fair not-to-be-missed. We sold well to both institutions and private collectors; strong institutional support started on day one and never wavered. Particular attention was on Ebony G. Patterson due to her upcoming solo show at Pérez Art Museum in fall 2018. 21c Museum Hotels - long-time supporters of Patterson who first encountered her work at Untitled years ago - acquired the Patterson floor tapestry we had on view.” --Monique Meloche, Founder/Owner, Monique Meloche Gallery, Chicago
“This was our fifth year at Untitled, Miami Beach and, once again, it offered a truly exciting art fair experience and proved that the market is very strong for collectors with a keen eye and broad vision who are looking for quality work and exceptional artists. The fair continued to attract high profile collectors, curators and advisers. We sold multiple works to both new and pre-existing collectors - with two artists' works entering prominent museum collections.” ---Luis De Jesus, Founder/Owner, Luis De Jesus Los Angeles, Los Angeles
“Our first participation at Untitled, Miami Beach resulted in one of our most successful fairs ever with sales for each of our artists, including an outstanding 26 pieces sold by Zanele Muholi. The fair is beautifully organized, the work presented by the exhibitors is excellent and the energy was high throughout the week. We had visits from multiple museums including the Tate, the Guggenheim, the Nasher and the Indianapolis Museum of Art in addition to several others. We look forward to returning in 2018.” ---Yancey Richardson, Owner, Yancey Richardson Gallery, New York
“Galerie Ron Mandos has worked with Untitled, Miami Beach for the past three years. The gallery has had the pleasure of exhibiting artists in the amply lit tent alongside an established body of international galleries. Working with Omar López-Chahoud and the Untitled team brought about three years of excellence, successfully curated booths, and the right amount of foot traffic to allow for personal engagement with the viewers and collectors that is sometimes lost at other fairs. This edition we were able to sell several paintings by Katinka Lampe to the Museum21C in Louisville, videos and photographs by our South African artist Mohau Modisakeng to museums in the US and Europe, and works from Hans Op de Beeck and young Levi van Veluw to the finest collections in the US.” ---Ron Mandos, Owner, Galerie Ron Mandos, Amsterdam
“Untitled, Miami Beach provided a qualitative platform on all fronts. We placed works with institutional, corporate and private collections, were happy to revisit outstanding colleagues from the US, and perceived an unusually long fair to pass by too quickly. I congratulate the fair curators, artistic director and entire team on a job well done.” --Harlan Levey, Founder, Harlan Levey Projects, Brussels
“This year's iteration of Untitled was the most successful fair we've ever had in Miami. We have participated in Untitled, Miami Beach every year since its inception and we've watched it evolve in so many dynamic ways. This year, the conversations with curators, artists, collectors and patrons of the fair were very invigorating and sales were very strong. Untitled is an art fair of content and intelligence.” ---Andrew Rafacz, Founder, Andrew Rafacz Gallery, Chicago
Programming for the 2017 edition was led by Director of Programming and Development Amanda Schmitt, in collaboration with Artistic Director Omar López-Chahoud. The programming for Untitled, Miami Beach’s sixth edition continued the fair’s unique curatorial vision highlighting both historic and contemporary works, and reflecting a number of strong curatorial themes that grew out of the main show. The concepts explored in this year’s projects and programming were particularly relevant in relation to recent events and included notions of structure, shelter and national identity.
Highlights of special projects included a recreation of Gordon Matta-Clark’s Garbage Wall, presented by the Estate of Gordon Matta-Clark in collaboration with students from Florida International University Honors College; GAMMA GALERÍA’s presentation of Thiago Martins de Melo’s Deus Cortado; a large selection of works by the prominent French-Venezuelan artist Carlos Cruz-Diez, presented by the Savannah College of Art and Design (SCAD), both inside the fair and in a ‘mobile museum’ in a shipping container located just outside Untitled’s pavilion; Sergio Vega’s Shanty: on the mimetic faculty presented by Galleria Umberto di Marino; Lucy + Jorge Orta’s Antarctic Village - No Borders, Dome Dwelling presented by Jane Lombard Gallery, and Hotspot, a collaborative presentation by Bogotá’s CARNE and San Juan’s Km 0.2.
Other programming elements incorporated a performative element with the artist-run Galerie offering visitors the opportunity to request, engage with and experience performance and immaterial works enacted by artists Adriano Wilfert Jensen and Simon Asencio, and Jamie Felton’s daily sunset dance performance that took place on the beach, Stork Phrase Lines Up With The Shoreline, created in collaboration with choreographer Alexsa Durrans and curated by Untitled’s Krysta Eder.
Returning for the third year, Untitled, Radio continued to offer a dynamic alternative to the standard art fair program of talks, panels and lectures, providing and exciting and accessible platform for discussion, public engagement, sound works, performance, and curated playlists. Untitled, Radio once again partnered with Miami’s own Wynwood Radio, and was located in a site-specific, architectural project by SiTE:LAB’s Paul Amenta with architect Ted Lott of Lott3Metz Architecture. Entitled Radio Station – Miami Folly II, the steel frame structure also incorporated Not Design, a collaborative letterpress studio that has worked with SiTE:LAB since 2010. A full archive of the week’s programming will soon be available on www.untitledartfairs.com.
Several galleries in the sixth edition of Untitled, Miami Beach focused on different conceptual and formal approaches to photography through a cross-generational selection of artists. Yossi Milo Gallery (New York) presented works by Marco Breuer, Karl Martin Holzhäuser, Gottfried Jäger and Alison Rossiter, a group of photographers whose work represents the 20th century Concrete Art movement. RocioSantaCruz (Barcelona) presented historic works by Marcel Giró and Ferran Garcia Sevilla, as well as new works by contemporary artists Mar Arza and Andrés Galeano. Yancey Richardson (New York) presented new photographs by Zanele Muholi, Paul Mpagi Sepuya and Mickalene Thomas. Benrubi Gallery (New York) showed three generations of photographers including Roger Steffens, Simon Norfolk and André Cepeda, whose work stands as a testament to the power of the social document.
Untitled, Miami Beach, 2017 included numerous strong solo booth presentations that included new exhibitor False Flag (New York) with a suite of four sculptures by Sterling Crispin; Kravets Wehby Gallery (New York) with the work of Allison Zuckerman; SMAC Gallery (Cape Town, Stellenbosch) presented the work of Jody Paulsen; Zilberman Gallery (Istanbul) with the work of Heba Y. Amin; Carrie Secrist Gallery (Chicago) with a selection of paintings by Shannon Finley; Fort Gansevoort (New York) with a presentation of work by Deborah Roberts, and Kleindienst (Leipzig) with work by Christoph Ruckhäberle.
As part of its curatorial ethos, Untitled integrates not-for-profit and artist-run exhibition spaces into the overall layout of the fair, positioning artworks and artists in direct dialogue. This year’s non-profit exhibitors included the Aperture Foundation, Brodsky Center at Rutgers University, EXILE Books with the Sackner Archive of Concrete and Visual Poetry, KM.02 and SculptureCenter.
In January 2018, Untitled will return to the San Francisco Bay Area with the second edition Untitled, San Francisco, taking place at the iconic Palace of Fine Arts. Untitled will continue to present another compelling art fair experience, with major artist projects, collaborations with outstanding Bay Area institutions, non-profit and artist-run exhibition spaces, and a thoughtfully curated selection of top international exhibitors.
