It is that time of year when hundreds of art aficionados flock to the University of Miami’s campus for one of the leading art festivals in the country. For more than six decades the Beaux Arts Festival of Art has brought together people from all walks of life to experience a festival that raises funds to benefit the University’s Lowe Art Museum.
“There is heavy tradition behind the Beaux Art Festival. Over the years it’s brought generations of people together,” said Jill Deupi, director of the Lowe Art Museum. “Art is a universal language, and this festival presents art in an approachable setting, in essence bringing a lot of enjoyment to family and friends.”
The Beaux Arts Festival of Art first began in 1952, originally called the “Clothesline Sale,” which gave young artists a chance to meet the buying public. Throughout the years the festival has grown into an annual project and is now a juried show with over 200 participating artists in 10 different mediums on the grounds of the Coral Gables campus.
“Our mission is to support the art museum as well as to encourage an appreciation of art in our community,” said Lauren Dowlen, president of the Beaux Arts Festival of Art. “It is a deep honor to be part of this beloved jewel and incredibly humbling to be part of this organization.”
The festival also includes a student artist showcase where middle school and high school students from both public and private schools enter their works of art to a juried art contest where over 350 art pieces are judged. The top 150 entries are then exhibited inside the Lowe Art Museum. Deupi believes this is a great opportunity for young artists.
“Having the opportunity to receive recognition is incredibly affirming and encouraging. I think positive reinforcement gives students the sense of wanting to continue their studies in art,” she said.
The Beaux Arts Festival of Art runs from Jan. 18 and Jan. 19 from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m.
For more information visit https://www.lowe.miami.edu/
Below are exhibitions showcased at the Lowe and events at other venues during the month of January.
Lowe Art Museum
Through Jan. 19, 2020
Diago: The Pasts of this Afro-Cuban Present
A leading member of the new Afro-Cuban cultural movement, visual artist Juan Roberto Diago has produced a body of work that offers a revisionist history of the Cuban nation. His “history,” a term that he frequently inserts in his works using the visual language of graffiti, contradicts the official narrative of a racially harmonious nation created through the selfless efforts of generous white patriots. Diago’s Cuba is a nation built on pain, rape, greed, and the enslavement of millions of displaced Africans, a nation still grappling with the long-term effects of slavery and colonialism. To him, slavery is not the past, but a daily experience of racism and discrimination. Africa is not a root, but a wellspring of cultural and personal affirmation, the ancestors that sustain him in his journey. This exhibit examines Diago’s creative work over the course of his entire career. It traces his singular efforts to construct new pasts, the pasts required to explain the racial tensions of contemporary Cuba, the pasts of this Afro-Cuban present. Guest curated by Alejandro de la Fuente, Robert Woods Bliss Professor of Latin American History and Economics, professor of African and African American Studies, director of the Afro-Latin American Research Institute at the Hutchins Center for Africa and African American Research, and chair of the Cuba Studies Program at Harvard University.
Thursday, Jan. 23, 7 to 9 p.m.
Opening Reception: Binomial: Claudia DeMonte & Ed McGowin
Description: The Lowe Art Museum is delighted to be hosting the first joint exhibition of artists Claudia DeMonte and Ed McGowin’s work in South Florida. Entitled Binomial, this engaging show explores not only the independent endeavors of these two highly accomplished artists but also the creative symbiosis that has marked their shared lives and careers for more than three decades.
Saturday, Jan. 25, 12 to 3 p.m.
Community Day
Description: Community Days offer children and adults the opportunity to explore art and culture through an array of music, dance, storytelling and hands-on art-making activities.
Through March 2020
ArtLab at the Lowe: Russia Unframed
Russia Unframed seeks to highlight the impact of Russia's immense cultural, ethnic, racial, and religious diversity on the arts, both within its borders and throughout the diaspora. Now in its tenth year, ArtLab @ the Lowe is an annual student-curated exhibition that provides University of Miami students with hands-on experience in the curatorial and museum fields.
Through May 3, 2020
Carlos Estévez: Cities of the Mind
The most recent project of renowned Cuban-American artist Carlos Estévez, Walled Cities features nine large-format circular paintings that reference the artist’s fascination with city plans. Inspired by the Havana of his youth, the Medieval European cities to which he has traveled extensively as an adult, and his abiding interest in symbolic cosmology and origin stories, Estévez has created in this body of new work personal maps of the human mind influenced by ancient cartography. Guest curated by Dr. Carol Damian, a former professor of Art History, Florida International University.
Frost School of Music's Maurice Gusman Concert Hall
Wednesday, Jan. 15 at 7:30 p.m.
Bitches Brew Revisited, a celebration of 50 years of Jazz fusion
Chuck Bergeron and John Daversa, Directors, Charles Pillow and Dave Liebman, Saxaphones, Shelly Berg and Martin Bejerano, Pianos, Frost Sextet and Frost Concert Jazz Band
Join the Frost Sextet and the Frost Concert Jazz Band as they revisit music from Miles Davis’s audacious “Bitches Brew,” released in 1970, reimagined in new arrangements by saxophonist Charles pillow. As part of his residency at Frost, NEA Jazz Master Saxophonist Dave Liebman, a Miles Davis sideman, performs with both Frost groups.
Saturday, Jan. 25 at 7:30 p.m.
Maria Schneider presents Donny McCaslin With the Frost School’s Henry Mancini Institute Orchestra (HMI)
Maria Schneider, artistic director
Scott Flavin, resident conductor, Donny McCaslin, saxophone
In her concert debut as Artistic Director of the Frost School’s Henry Mancini Institute Orchestra, NEA Jazz Master composer, arranger, bandleader, and recipient of twelve Grammy nominations and five Grammy awards, Maria Schneider presents a program featuring saxophonist Donny McCaslin.
Thursday, Jan. 30 at 7:30 p.m.
String Music for a Winter’s Evening
Kevin Kenner, piano, Charles Castleman, violin, The Stamps String Quartet
Come and enjoy an evening of musical virtuosity. The superb program opens with Eugene Ysaye’s Sonata No.3 in D minor “Ballade,” for unaccompanied violin, and also his exquisite Snows of Yesteryear, originally scored for violin and string orchestra. Cesar Franck’s Sonata in A Major for Violin and Piano; and Gabriel Faure’s elegant Piano Quartet No.1 round up the evening’s program.
Center for the Humanities
Thursday, Jan. 16 from 12 to 12:50 p.m.
The Evolving Humanities Series: Hugh Thomas
Lau Founders Hall, Room A
The Center for the Humanities and the Osher Lifelong Learning Institute present a series of four brief lectures on humanities disciplines, including history, religious studies, English, and philosophy. In keeping with OLLI programming, these talks are designed for community members aged 50 and better but limited seating may be available for other guests.
Cosford Cinema
Showings this month include “Once Upon a Time in Hollywood,” “Oscar Shorts” and “Hustlers”
For showtimes and tickets, visit http://www.cosfordcinema.com/
