News

Letters from the Issue of June 19-25, 2002

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Don't dis or dismiss my main man: "Lehtinen for Mayor" was a very nice piece. My only concern or complaint is the downplaying of candidates such as Jimmy Morales. Commissioner Morales has always been an excellent public servant and a leader within his district. He's one candidate who shouldn't be written off so quickly.

Fernando Cordal

Miami

And lay off the Valium, okay? I just finished Alfredo Triff's thorough and deeply felt palpation on the local art scene ("Conceptual Drag," May 22), and as always I came away delighted at his enthusiasm and boundless heart. He's a rare bird. You can almost feel the ache of longing for the raveup long ago through the sinuous weave of his arguments, and hear the gnashing of his teeth. It's an unusual talent in a writer to make language live so.

Not that I could discern his point.

I certainly sensed his affinity for the more spontaneous art moments of yesteryear, and a lofty displeasure with anything in the art world having to do with commerce. But to what, exactly, he was referring at any given moment in the article was a mystery. I would like to know, for instance, which commercial galleries do not "show art for the love of it." Like them or leave them, you'd be hard-pressed to name dealers hereabouts who are simply money-grubbers, who do not care deeply about the artists they represent. Why else would they be doing business in Miami?

Exactly which curators "lack awareness"? Which ones do not understand "the distinction between the interests of museums they serve and their duty as purveyors of aesthetic and ethical lucidity"? Aside from the Lowe, he must be speaking of the Museum of Contemporary Art and Miami Art Museum. Bonnie Clearwater's choice of Helen Frankenthaler at MoCA is not aesthetically lucid? What does it mean to be aesthetically lucid, anyway? It's not ethical for her to show Trenton Doyle Hancock, whose scatological, bum-fucking fun seems to perfectly capture the flamboyant nowness that Alfredo savors?

As to the "slide" of the Miami art scene as evidenced by the present run of shows, let me recall the methods of Tom Peterson, a used-car salesman I used to watch on late-night television as a lad, who, at some point during his after-midnight hocus-pocus, would rap on the camera and shout at his audience dozing on the other side of the screen: "Wake up! Wake up!"

I wish I were that used-car salesman and I could shout at Alfredo. What powerful tranqs must he be on to overlook Jesse Bransford's mural at Locust Projects, an anamorphic marvel that seems to snap into view as you scan it, and a tour de force for the Locusts. The vastly underreported Spanish Cultural Center has, at this moment, an entirely unprecedented exhibition of Cuban photographers from both the island and this notoriously cantankerous side of the straits -- a solid and at moments incandescent show of some of the best contemporary photography being done anywhere. We have Sandra Ramos at Casas Riegner, a likewise rare occasion for similar reasons: Ramos lives and works in Havana. And for a man who prides himself on being down with the peeps, I'm surprised at how little we've heard from Alfredo about Diaspora Vibe's graffiti, hip-hop, and low-rider youthfest.

The worst thing about all this easy outrage and woozy thinking is that it plays into the thoroughly debased discourse about art here in Miami, where the demagogic bile of a Marty Margulies can actually pass as public service, and where we have to listen endlessly to the masturbatory snivelings of certain crybaby artists who puke and mewl no matter how much is put on their plate. Insofar as Alfredo means to champion deserving local talent who languish without significant exposure, I couldn't agree more. I can think of a number of local artists who deserve museum shows -- right now. But I would certainly say as much if I were trying to say as much.

I suppose it's a stretch to expect sparkling logic, velvety phrasing, and an exquisite sense of melodrama in a single warm body, though in the admirably loquacious Alfredo I always hope for more than just that ratcheted-up emotional turn, that precious, heat-bearing whatever.

Joel Weinstein

Miami

Yesterday's galleries, today's saloons: I understand Alfredo Triff's "Conceptual Drag" only too well. I've lived and breathed the Miami art "scene" for most of my life, being a native of 25 years, and I agree with most of his points. But there is one thing he didn't address: maturity of patrons.

What we have here is nothing more than a group of people viewing art, collecting art, talking art, all with a concern for how it compares in glory with New York, Paris, Iraq, and so on. They don't care. You really think that half the people at many events give a damn about art? No. They are there for the social occasion. But that shouldn't matter to the artists. They should be pushing the envelope, though it's harder to do that when people only show up if you're sponsored by Bacardi or Heineken so they can get drunk. You didn't notice?

Don't worry, I was probably wasted next to you.

Juan Navarro

Hialeah

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