Robert Nava, Eye to Eye with Ghost, 2019, Boil, Toil + Trouble Exhibit
Both Zoe Lukov and Abby Pucker have been in cultural production long enough to understand how art can impact social habits. So for the first exhibition of their newly founded Art in Common non-profit, debuting in Miami, the co-curators decided to confront the existential and metaphysical.
“Boil, Toil + Trouble” brings together 40 artists who through various practices engage the alchemy of water, the source of life and destruction (particularly for Miami). It opens on November 29 in Miami’s Design District, then travels to Los Angeles in February 2023, and Chicago in April 2023 (timed to the art fairs).
The duo founded this creative enterprise to chart “new avenues of access to contemporary art nationwide that speak to the most pressing creative, sociopolitical, and spiritual issues of our time.” Pucker’s own background fuses the creative economy and civic engagement, sitting on the boards of Pioneer Works, The Marshall Project, and Ghetto Film School. She is also the founder of Chicago’s cultural engagement platform Gertie. Lukov is fresh off Faena, where she served as chief curator in Miami and Buenos Aires, and was a founding board member of Desert X. She now works full-time with Art in Common.
Zoe Lukov
We’ve seen Miami explode as a cultural destination because of art and design, and with the 20th anniversary of ABMB, how can art and design transform a city?
ZL: Miami was my home for almost 7 years (until very recently), and during that time I witnessed the ways in which providing space for artists and creatives across disciplines can be transformative for all of us. ABMB has evolved into an incredibly powerful convening moment for artists, arts workers, and supporters from around the world, and it has really become a moment each year to shine a light on the work artists are doing in Miami all year round.
Nicolette Mishkan The Protection Circle, 2022, Boil, Toil + Trouble Exhibi
In Art in Common’s inaugural exhibition “Boil, Toil + Trouble,” which opens during Miami Art Week in the Design District, we commissioned five new works from Miami artists which are placed in dialogue with canonical works by renowned artists who have been dealing with concepts of the sacred, magic, alchemy, and water for decades. Miami has historically provided space for artists to create across disciplines with little-to-no oversight from traditional gatekeepers. As such, the mix of rituals from across the Americas, art deco architecture, performance-based work, and embodied practices have thrived here since at least the early 80s. The relationship as well between Miami artists and the natural world—both its beauty and destruction—has created a unique visual lexicon and aesthetic vocabulary as well as provided a blueprint for artists to engage with issues of climate change.
What challenges does Miami face in terms of the arts?
ZL: I think one of the challenges Miami faces is that outsiders underestimate the city as an event-based place that is frivolous or somehow itinerant—but there is a wealth of ancient knowledge and practices from across the Americas, namely Haiti, Cuba and beyond that inform the contemporary art practices in the city as well as a rich history of contemporary art and creation. There are incredibly vibrant contemporary artists and cutting-edge galleries that are challenging and shifting the conversation beyond just Miami and it is short-sighted to miss the broader cultural movements globally that Miami is contributing to. Miami has always had and continues to have reverberations around the world.
ABBY PUCKER
How are you helping write the future of the arts/design in Miami?
AP: I see the future of arts/design in Miami to be full of cross-disciplinary and sector collaboration, building on the models that have been cultivated over time by spaces like Miami Design District. At Art in Common, we are, in a lot of ways, working as intermediaries between funders and artists to give artists opportunities to produce new works or reinstall works in a way that provides creative freedom that is not commercially driven. We are allowing the work to stand on its own and to engage in expansive multigenerational artistic dialogues conceived by Zoe through the curation of exhibitions like Boil, Toil + Trouble. As a not-for-profit, Art in Common works across sectors to engage public and private support systems to create exhibitions and other forms of art encounters that are free and accessible to all. I believe this type of collaborative model is essential in order to continue to build a thriving creative economy not just in Miami but in the country as a whole.
Some cities are hubs for art/design but not the market. What makes Miami ripe for both?
AP: I think the success of the art and design scene cannot be separated from the larger economic forces in a city. Miami is home to many of the largest national arts funders, whether foundations or individuals. While they are funding nationally, these entities have strong ties to Miami and are helping to bolster the ecosystem locally. These organizations, especially the Knight Foundation, in my opinion, have done something very strategic. They have used philanthropic capital to catalyze arts and cultural projects that become larger civic projects that then in turn garner attention and support from highly visible sources of support, leading to increased local engagement and job creation in the creative ecosystem. This all leads to a better ability to attract and retain young, diverse, high-quality talent to the city, supporting the creation of a group of new potential collectors in addition to the existing collectors and funders. This support, including the building of visual art and art-adjacent organizations, is essential to creating an economy that allows artists to exist and thrive in a city.
