No-VacancyPeoplesChoiceAnnouncement
We are committed to providing excellent public service and safety to all who live, work and play in our vibrant, tropical, historic
community.
City of Miami Beach, 1700 Convention Center Drive, Miami Beach, FL 33139, www.miamibeachfl.gov
OFFICE OF MARKETING & COMMUNICATIONS, Tel: 305.673.7575 PRESS RELEASE
Tonya Daniels, E-mail: tonyadaniels@miamibeachfl.gov
Melissa Berthier, E-mail: melissaberthier@miamibeachfl.gov
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
Dec. 18, 2020
French Artist Duo Scenocosme
Wins $5,000 People’s Choice Award at
No Vacancy, Miami Beach
Miami Beach, FL — The City of Miami Beach, in collaboration with the Miami Beach
Visitor and Convention Authority (MBVCA) is pleased to announce that the No Vacancy
People’s Choice Award has been presented to Scenocosme for their work titled
Akousmaflore. The French duo received the majority of the over 3,300 public votes cast
during the duration of No Vacancy, which debuted for Miami Art Week on Dec. 2 and
concluded Dec. 12.
“No Vacancy was a great opportunity for us to be able to bring our interactive artwork to
the United States, and we are honored to win the public vote,” says Grégory Lasserre &
Anaïs met den Ancxt, who together comprise Scenocosme. “This was a difficult project
to manage from France while travel was restricted due to the COVID-19 crisis. We were
forced to install the exhibition remotely but were able to work with a wonderful team on
the ground in Miami Beach. The Lennox Miami Beach hotel was a gracious host for our
installation, and we look forward to showing more of our projects in South Florida in the
coming years.”
We are committed to providing excellent public service and safety to all who live, work and play in our vibrant, tropical, historic
community.
Installed at the Lennox Miami Beach, Akousmaflore is a small garden composed of living
musical plants which react to gentle contact. Each plant reacts in a different way to
contact by producing a specific sound. The plant or song occurs through touch and the
close proximity of the spectator. With multiple sounds, a plant concert can be created.
Through Akousmaflore, plants let visitors know about their existence by a scream, a
melody or an acoustical vibration.
No Vacancy is a juried art competition that celebrates artists, provokes critical discourse
and invites the public to experience Miami Beach’s famed hotels as destination art
spaces. Artists were drawn from a call for submissions issued by the city in February
2020 and selected by representatives from the City of Miami Beach Art in Public Places
Committee (AiPP), Cultural Arts Council and MBVCA.
For the inaugural edition of No Vacancy, $25,000 in prizes were awarded. On Dec. 4 the
No Vacancy Juried Prize was awarded to Die-Cast for the artist collaborative’s work
titled Temporary Occupancy. The work was selected from the 10 participating artists and
collectives by a jury of Miami Beach art experts including Silvia Karman Cubiña, Director
and Chief Curator of The Bass Museum of Art; Dennis Scholl, Executive Director of
Oolite Arts and Maria Elena Ortiz, Associate Curator at the Perez Art Museum Miami.
For additional information please visit: www.mbartsandculture.org/no-vacancy
Funding for this project is provided by the City of Miami Beach Cultural Arts Council,
Miami Beach Visitor and Convention Authority and the Greater Miami Convention and
Visitors Bureau.
Artists Gregory Lasserre and Anais met den Ancxt make up the artist duo
Scenocosme, based in the Rhone-Alpes region in France. Their singular artworks use
diverse expressions: interactive installations, visual art, digital art, sound art and
collective performances. Scenocosme mixes art and digital technology to find
substances of dreams, poetry, sensitivity and delicacy. The artists use various
technologies in order to create contemporary artworks.
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About the Miami Beach Cultural Arts Council
The Cultural Arts Council (CAC) is an eleven-member council created in 1997 for the
purpose of developing, coordinating and promoting the performing and visual arts in the
City of Miami Beach. The CAC serves as arts advocates before governmental bodies,
coordinates collective marketing initiatives for the local arts community and funds not-
for-profit arts organizations. Since the program’s inception, the CAC has awarded
approximately $18 million in cultural arts grants, supporting thousands of performances,
exhibits, and other cultural activities in Miami Beach.
About the Miami Beach Visitor and Convention Authority
The MBVCA is a seven-member authority, appointed by the City of Miami Beach
Commission, with the goal of encouraging, developing and promoting the image of
Miami Beach locally, nationally and internationally as an outstanding tourist destination.
To this end, the MBVCA strategically focuses its funding investments in a balanced
manner, fostering outstanding existing programs, stimulating new activities, and
encouraging partnerships. The MBVCA is committed to a careful, long-term plan for
allocation of resources to help Miami Beach thrive as a destination with something for
everyone.
We are committed to providing excellent public service and safety to all who live, work and play in our vibrant, tropical, historic
community.
Media Contact
For additional information, images and interview requests please contact:
David Simantov
Blue Medium, Inc.
E: david@bluemedium.com
T: 212.675.1800
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participate in any city-sponsored proceedings, call 305.604.2489 and select 1 for English or 2 for Spanish, then option 6; TTY users may call via 711 (Florida Relay Service).