Nov. 28, 2005 

ART BASEL MIAMI BEACH
With 195 galleries from five continents, Art Basel Miami Beach is a beacon of art-star power, ranging from Acquavella Galleries (New York), Aizpuru (Madrid) and Arndt & Partner (Berlin, Zurich) to White Cube (London), Donald Young (Chicago) and Zeno X (Antwerp). Now in its fourth year, the fair takes place at the spacious and modern Miami Beach Convention Center, located only a short walk from the ocean.

This year, Art Basel Miami Beach’s multitudinous roster includes "Art Nova," a section devoted to art made in the last two years; "Art Positions," 20 galleries housed in a special "shipping-container village" at the beach in Collins Park; and the "Art Video Lounge," featuring works by Yvonne Rainer, Ken Jacobs, Pipilotti Rist, Michael Snow and others at a new location, the Botanical Garden at 2000 Convention Drive. 

Art Basel Miami Beach has several new features this year, including "Art Perform," a series of daily performances at "Art Positions" at Collins Park, and the "Art Kabinett," special curated exhibitions in separate spaces at the booths of 15 dealers at the fair. "Art Kabinett" includes shows of work by Robert Rauschenberg at Weber Jamileh (Zurich), Chris Ofili at Contemporary Fine Arts (Berlin) and Iñigo Manglano-Ovalle at Max Protetch (New York).

For VIPs, the fair includes special visits to local collections, including the Marguilies Collection at the Warehouse, the Rubell Family Collection, the Rosa & Carlos de la Cruz Collection in Key Biscayne and the new Cisneros Fontanals Art Foundation at 1018 North Miami Avenue, which features two exhibitions from the collection: "Indeterminate States" organized by new Rose Art Museum director Michael Rush and "Beyond Delirious" organized by Christopher Phillips, curator of the International Center of Photography.

DESIGN.05 MIAMI
Across the causeway in Miami proper is an area of warehouses and shops called the Miami Design District, which this year is home to Design.05 Miami, a new fair of furniture, design and the applied arts installed in the Moore Building at 191 NE 40th Street. The 15 galleries participating are Antik (New York), Barry Friedman Ltd. (New York), Casati Gallery (Chicago), Contrasts Gallery (Hong Kong), Cristina Grajales Inc. (New York), David Gill Gallery (London), Demisch Danant (New York), Galerie Downtown – François Laffanour (Paris), La Galerie Italienne (Paris), Galerie Kreo (Paris), Galerie Patrick Seguin (Paris), Jousse Entreprise (Paris), Magen H. Gallery (New York), Nilifar (Milano) and R 20th Century (New York).

Among the highlights of this fair: a site-specific installation by celebrated architect Zaha Hadid, who also gets the inaugural "Designer of the Year" honor awarded by Design.05, and a grotto of plants, bamboo and water lily ponds adjacent to the fair, created by Swiss landscape designer Enzo Enea.

NADA ART FAIR
The Nada Art Fair, now in its third year, is organized by the New Art Dealers Alliance, and promises to be a locus of new art energy. Located in the bucolic Ice Palace Film Studios on NW 14th Street in Miami, some 80 galleries from 18 countries are expected, including  Sutton Lane (London), Participant (New York) and Art:Concept (Paris). Last year, Christian Viveros-Faune of the Brooklyn gallery Roebling Hall said, "The doors opened at 11 a.m. and people came in and just started buying things."

SCOPE MIAMI
Scope Miami, the now-veteran hotel fair, sets up again this year at the Townhouse Hotel on West 20th Street and Collins Avenue. Look out for Tracey Snelling’s dioramas of seedy Americana at San Francisco’s Brown Bag Contemporary/Osborne Samuel Gallery, Tricia Cline’s all-white sculptures of surreal medieval personages at New York’s Ricco/Maresca Gallery and distorted images that reference pornography from Carlos Ranc at Mexico City’s Reyes + Haas.

PULSE MIAMI & THE AQUA ART FAIR
As if that wasn’t already enough, along comes Pulse Miami, debuting under the directorship of Helen Allen and promising over 60 galleries in a 30,000-square-foot tent set up at NW 2nd Avenue, blocks away from the Rubell and Margulies collections. Exhibitors range from Conner Contemporary (Washington, D.C.), DCKT Contemporary (New York) and Galerie Volker Diehl (Berlin) to Andrew Mummery Gallery (London), Thatcher Projects (New York), and Galerie Zurcher (Paris).

The Aqua Art Fair, organized by a group of Seattle dealers, presents 35 galleries from North America and Europe, including Inman (Houston), Gallery Joe (Philadelphia), Greg Kucera (Seattle), Revolution (Detroit), Western Project (Los Angeles) and Winston Wachter Fine Art (New York). The fair takes place at the Aqua Hotel located on Collins Avenue between 16th Street and Española Way.

AND MORE. . .
The Miami Art Museum features "Ana Mendieta Earth Body Sculpture and Performance 1972-1985," "Shazia Sikander - Nemesis" and "Figuratively Speaking," while the Museum of Contemporary Art in North Miami is exhibiting "Albert Oehlen: I Know Whom You Showed Last Summer," "Isaac Julien: True North" and "Pablo Cano: The Beginning." The Norton Museum of Art in West Palm Beach has "Deborah Butterfield: Horses," "Candida Hofer: Architecture of Absense" and "French Impressionism from the Museum of Fine Arts, Boston."

The Wolfsonian-FIU on Washington Avenue in Miami Beach features "In Pursuit of Pleasure: Schultze & Weaver and the American Hotel" and "Art and Design in the Modern Age." The Wynwood Art District Tour includes the new Emmanuel Perrotin Gallery at 174 NW 30th Street, as well as shows of new works by Julie Mehretu at World Class Boxing and exhibitions at MOCA at Goldman Warehouse, Locust Projects, the Yard at CasaLin, Fredric Snitzer Gallery and Kevin Bruk Gallery.