Deering Estate Arts Eleven Voices Exhibit Catalogue | Page 4

CURATOR’S STATEMENT AND EXHIBITION
FOREWORD
As she agreed to co-curate this project, she graced me with the compliment, “Thank you so much for
the work that you do supporting artists in our community”, an honor that has made me very proud
of the Deering Estate leadership and mission, our own artist-in residence program, and my role in
guiding this process.
KIM YANTIS Gordon-Wallace and I began with discussions of contemporary South-African art and how her
visiting residency artists and artwork collection would add to the story of identity struggle and
political protest present in so many SA artist’s work. Ultimately, we asked ourselves how in the world
would we find enough South African art and artists in Miami?
Presenting a nationally-themed exhibit for each of the six years of my tenure as Deering
Estate’s Curator, I have been challenged to find primarily local artists that fit into a national or
cultural identity. This annual opportunity to present contemporary art from different regions
of the world has led to meetings with international consulates, reaching out to community
members, and an intensive process of studio visits, artwork selection, and working lunches.
(with over 250 artists and curators in South Florida) This question spawned a collaboration with Kathryn Mikesell (foundress of the Fountainhead
Residency and Studios). Her continued dedication to hosting emerging international artists,
encouraging them to deeply interact with the rich cultural fabric of Miami, has left me awestruck.
Having met several of her international visiting artists over the past eight years, and having
exhibited the work of one of these at the Estate, SA artist Rowan Smith in 2011, I was generously
offered works from Mikesell’s collection to be highlighted in the show.
The ELEVEN VOICES exhibition at Deering Estate will forever sit in my mind as a collaboration
of incredible women who are dedicated to supporting artists and elevating the arts through
residencies, exhibitions, and collection. Several days after this confirmation, Miami-based SA Artist Anja Marais was de-installing her Spring
Contemporary artwork ‘Famished Road’ at the Deering Estate. As we lifted buckets of cement
together and chatted about featuring her at the upcoming South-African show, she asked, “Can you
imagine that even watching the evening news becomes a challenge in a place where eleven official
languages need to be presented?”. The title ELEVEN VOICES was born.
Beginning in early 2016, I contacted Rosie Gordon-Wallace, Curator and Director of Diaspora
Vibe Cultural Arts Incubator (DVCAI), with the intention to work together for the first time. I was
a great admirer of her extraordinary work, as for the past 20 years she has been finding ways
to bring Caribbean artists to the Miami community, present their work, and support exchange
residencies and forums in our major institutions.
Through Marais and a defiant Wynwood cocktail hour scheduled during the Miami Zika scare, a
meeting with Petra Mason, Miami-based South African publisher and cultu ral historian, tied the
project’s loose ends together. Petra, daughter of renowned SA artist Judith Mason, happens to be an