With a mind to conserve our energy for the art-filled week ahead of us, Constant Companion and I once again divided Day #2 of the 2025 Prelude to Art into two outings. After the morning “breakfast” at the Mindy Solomon Gallery in the Allapattah,* we returned home. Day #2 continued early in the evening after the rush hour and art-driven traffic (always an issue this week) had somewhat cleared out.

*The name Allapattah comes from the Seminole word for alligator. This former warehouse neighborhood is rapidly filling with art galleries, migrating from high rent locations. In fact, on Sunday, Constant Companion and Daughter spent much of the day there for the monthly progressive art brunch.

The Mindy Solomon Gallery, established in 2009, specializes in contemporary emerging and mid-career artists and art advisory services. The gallery represents artists working in painting, sculpture, photography, and video in both narrative and non-objective styles. This year for the Art Week season, she features three artists, of which I saw two.

Constant Companion and I, with many others, were drawn to the gallery for a breakfast with artist by British-born, New York–based artist Zoë Buckman and the opportunity to meet the artist. The title of Buckman’s exhibit, “Who By Fire,” is taken from Leonard Cohen’s reinterpretation of the Jewish Prayer, Unetaneh Tokef. Her work includes photographs of family and community members that represent an exploration of Jewish identity, memory, and collective resilience.

The photos are printed on vintage domestic textiles and enhanced with hand embroidery and applique. The images explore themes of the current state of violence against women and anti-Semitism.

The second exhibit in Solomon’s space, “Indigenous Futurism,” is life-size sculptures of animals found in the Amazon rainforests of Peru. The intricately painted ceramic sculptures are the work of Shipibo tribe member Cecilia Vásquez Yui.

Yui uses polychrome earthenware pottery, a traditional material of the Shipibo-Conibo people. The figures are decorated with distinctive, intricate geometric patterns indicative of Shipibo mark-making. The patterns reflect their worldview, connecting them to nature, their cosmology, ancestral wisdom, and spiritual beliefs. The exhibit is a collaboration with the Shipibo Cultural Center in Harlem, New York, whose mission is to preserve and protect the Shipibo community.

After a leisurely conversation-filled morning, we returned home.

Our evening explorations took us from the Design District to Little Haiti. We started at the second annual Open Invitational, a unique show dedicated to “progressive art studios” exhibiting artists with disabilities.

The goal of the founders, New York dealer David Fierman and Rachel Carle Cohen with arts patron Ross McCalla of the Outsider Institute, is to build artists’ careers and dismantle outmoded hierarchies in the contemporary art world (whatever that may mean!). This show is a platform for the art of people with disabilities and seeks to bring public recognition to their work.

The fair was founded on the idea that collectors should be able to acquire great works of art while also doing their part to build a more open and equitable art world.

Andrew Li, “Untitled (DogRescue)” (2019) (image courtesy Creativity Explored)

We were first drawn to City State, a lively art space of showrooms, workshops, and studios in Little Haiti on the way to Nina Johnson’s gallery.  Founded by Jillian Mayer, the space is run and designed by artists with a gallery, multiple flexible spaces, and a sculpture garden. A wrapped Toyota vehicle with the recognizable patterns of established South Florida artist, Ahole Sniffs Glue, pointed directly to the City State.

The space was teaming with young artists and many others. Among the many conversations in which we engaged was a long one with Reggie O’Neal. Some years ago, I wrote about the mural he painted for the Longshoreman’s Association (12-7-22). He was also featured in the Meridians section of Art Basel (12-8-23). He is a young force to be reckoned with.

Next stop was Nina Johnson Gallery to take in three exhibits: “Acid Bath House,” a show curated by Jarrett Earnest in the Front Gallery, Dara Friedman’s “Star People” in the Upstairs Gallery, and in the Sculpture Garden, “Neon Sun,” an exhibition of functional outdoor works, e.g. chairs and tables, by Miami-based artist Emmett Moore.

I saw the structures in the garden, but because we of limited outdoor lighting in the night, I was not able to appreciate them. A lighted notice at the entry to the gallery announced that photography was prohibited. I wondered if perhaps the sign was a work of art when we recapped our day with Daughter when got home! Nevertheless, I followed the prohibition, except for one snap of a sculpture constructed of safety pins by an unknown artist – thanks to lack of labeling in the gallery!

This work reminded me of Abbas Mandegar’s garments in which he incorporates sewing tools such as scissors and pins that I saw a few weeks ago in the WeeGee in Espoo, Finland.

That’s a wrap and today, we will soon be off for another day as a few of the satellite art fairs are opening.