LTC 482-2019 Art in Public Life Resident Artist's Department of Reflection, Main Office Opens! (2) MIAMI BEACH
City of Miami Beach, 1700 Convention Center Drive, Miami Beach, Florida 33139, www.miamibeachfl.gov
Jimmy L. Morales, City Manager
Tel: 305-673-7010 , Fax: 305-673-7782
482-2019
NO. LTC# LETTER TO COMMISSION
TO: Mayor Dan Gelber and Members o' he City C•"Y mission
FROM: Jimmy L. Morales, City Manager
DaTE: August 26, 2019
SUBJECT: Art in Public Life Resident Artist . Department of Reflection, Main Office
Opens!
I am pleased to announce the opening of the main office for the Department of Reflection and
invite you to the opening event on September 14 from 2pm to 6pm at the Rotunda in Collins Park
located at 2100 Collins Avenue. You may ask, "What is the Department of Reflection?!"
The threat of climate change and sea level rise is affecting our city in challenging ways. These
issues require science and engineering, but also the speculative, conceptual, and creative. The
Department of Reflection is a temporary art installation created by Misael Soto, Miami Beach's
first and current Art in Public Life Artist in Residence. The Department of Reflection is a symbolic
office that explores the many challenges the city is facing via inventive and unconventional routes.
The office hours for the Department of Reflection will be every Saturday from 2-6pm until October
26, 2019 with special activations ranging from lectures and discussions to film screenings and
performance art. Misael brings together artists from multiple disciplines to participate in the
process of designing and constructing the installation. Visitors are invited to engage with the
office-inspired space over the course of the next two months. In addition to the event activations,
the multi-use space will be open to the public where anyone can interact with the artist, as well
as sit and enjoy a selection from its library, rent a tandem bike, or work on a map collage, amongst
other activities. You can stay up to date by visiting mbartsandculture.orq events calendar.
Misael joined the city a year ago under a
collaboration between Oolite Arts and the - f. a
city. Over the last year, Misael has been
embedded in the Environment and ' - -
Sustainability Department working closely
with the city and residents. Misael has , ,; 7`•
been participating in public meetings and .� -*s' .-. 4 0"`'
working with various departments
including, Code Compliance, Planning, -- r
Public Works, to learn more about the - it _ .
municipal government processes and
draw inspiration from the public servicer
employees whom work to serve the /
residents, businesses, and visitors of ----
Miami Beach. Misael has also been putting together public art moments such as last October's
"Sand".
According to the 2019 resident survey, 86% of residents feel that cultural activities contribute to
quality of life in our city and nearly the same amount feel that our city should sponsor this kind of
programming. The 2018 Urban Land Institute Advisory Panel Report recommended that the city
incorporate public art and placemaking in the stormwater management strategy. The Resilient
305 Action Plan's Objective 9: Communicate the Concept of Resilience and Action 41: See it to
Believe highlight the need and importance of fostering an emotional connection to resilience
through the arts.
Misael's up-coming project digs into the inner workings of our city via the creation of a symbolic
parallel department, the Department of Reflection. The Department of Reflection presents a foil
(or reflection) of the city while simultaneously presenting creative moments of exchange between
the city, its residents and visitors. And while the Department of Reflection aims to collaborate, it
also aims to push and interrogate the direction we are heading. Misael hopes the project will
engage the larger community and provide some clarity, and perhaps even some solutions to a
conversation that often excludes the arts.
Last year, Misael accomplished the very successful public artwork"Sand: Amphitheater, Theater,
Arena". Attended by more than 500 residents and seen by countless others over the course of a
month, the art installation borrowed 376 cubic yards of sand and 6,000 sandbags from the city's
Parks and Public Works Departments, respectively, to create a temporary gathering place to
discuss and reflect on the city's creation, history, and geology. Misael invited local and nationally
recognized artists, writers, poets, scientists, and historians to contribute throughout, some of them
creating new artworks in the process.
Looking even further into the future, our artist hopes to present another large-scale public project
similar to "Sand", but in this case honing in on the natural element essential to our everyday lives,
yet causing stress days -water.
Born in Puerto Rico (1986), Misael received an MFA from the School of Art Institute of Chicago
(2018) and graduated Magna Cum Laude with a bachelor's degree in Art History from Florida
Atlantic University(2008). Beyond public artworks shown extensively for many years, Misael has
exhibited at MCA Chicago, Open Engagement 2015, the Museum of Contemporary Art in North
Miami, Material Art Fair in Mexico City, David Castillo Gallery in Miami, Museum of Art in Fort
Lauderdale, and Young at Art Museum in Davie, Florida, amongst others, and participated in the
ACRE Residency Program in Steuben, Wisconsin and HomeBase Project's HB Build Artist-in
Residence program in Berlin. Misael was awarded the South Florida Cultural Consortium Award
for 2019 and an Ellie's Award from Oolite Arts (formerly Art Center/South Florida) in 2018. Misael
will be attending Bemis Center for Contemporary Arts Summer 2019 Residency and Santa Fe Art
Institute's 2019 Residency. You can learn more about Misael's work at www.misaelsoto.com/
If you have any questions, please contact the Environment & Sustainability Director, Elizabeth
Wheaton (elizabethwheatonna,miamibeachfl.gov).
JML/SMT/ESW