Most of the work in this fair was conservative, blue-chip, or established. One gallery, Kashya Hildebrand, provided something more edgy and exciting for a change. At Art Miami they provided one of the most hideous paintings at the fair, a work by one of their European artists. [+] The work I really liked by a Russian photographer, I was told, developed in an eastern coal mining region. With the fall of the Soviet economy miners that were not working became the willing models and preformers for a project that was largely a protest performance piece. [the letters reflected on the glass were from work mounted opposite the photos] Needless to say the men (I don’t recall seeing any women) were gritty and very raw. It was confrontational with a sexual edge. This work did not look like it was necessarily marketed toward a queer audience though. Sobe would have been a much better place to show these photographs but, instead, they had the big ugly paintings on their outside walls. If they had some of these photos at Art Miami I wouldn’t know; I avoided their booth like the plague. [click image to see larger view]
cultural practitioner / thoughts & essays