Each December, Miami and Miami Beach becomes the epicenter of the art world with approximately 1200 art galleries from around the world showing thousands of artists in the Art Basel/Miami Art Week extravaganza.
Around 50,000 people visit the area for this incredible week, and they come from all parts of the world. It’s also a week of fashion with gala openings and celebrity studded events that fill the warm nights.
Perhaps due its inherent glitz and glamor, or the vibrancy, lux and drama of the medium, glass is SO much part of the fair. Maybe because its has a strong relationship to sand – in any case, Washington Glass School artists were showing at Art Miami this year in force! And there was a lot of glass to look at in the Miami Fairs. Said WGS Co-Director Tim Tate, ” It never ceases to amaze me how many blue-chip artists use glass in their artwork”. Tim Tate and William Warmus will together present a lecture on glass medium at the Miami Art fairs at the 2019 Glass Art Society conference to be held in St. Petersburg, FL in March.
When it comes to Contemporary Art, the Art Miami is all about More, More, More. And that is what the Washington Glass School artists brought to the champagne-fueled cultural extravaganza.
William Warmus, art critic, author and former curator of & Fellow of Corning Museum of Glass wrote about Michael Janis’ work “…Michael Janis showed stunning new work at Alida Anderson at Art Miami/Context. The large four part panel “Stasis in the Darkness” made an impact on two levels: from across the aisle, and close up in the quality of the details. Do not overlook the small kiln formed panels and the expert way he introduces and plays with subtle variations of thicknesses of the stacked layers of glass. They are “The Truth of Dreams.”