Design Miami celebrates 10 year anniversary

Ten years ago, a small fair for collectible design named design.05 Miami launched concurrently with Art Basel Miami Beach. Located in the Moore Building in the Miami Design District, it offered a selection of 15 invited exhibitors, with the stated aim of bringing museumquality galleries together with the best collectors, connoisseurs, and designers from around the world in one of the premier destinations for art and design. Remaining true to that aim, the intervening decade has seen the blossoming and expansion of the fair alongside the market for collectible design, evidenced by the number of participating galleries, which has almost tripled in that period. As it has matured, Design Miami has lead the field in establishing new global standards for creative and inspiring exhibitions, turning the fair into an essential destination for the design press and enthusiasts as well as collectors.

Rodman Primack, Executive Director of Design Miami stated, “The fair grew out of the need for a consolidated marketplace that would act as a platform to showcase the range and strength of what was then a fledgling market.” Adding, “Since then, the collectible design market has really changed in scale; it’s internationalized and diversified, and this is reflected very clearly in the fair. Design Miami/ has changed the way galleries engage with their audiences. I am excited to see this ecosystem bringing so many distinct viewpoints and aesthetics together.”

The burgeoning interest in contemporary design from around the US is particularly evident this year, with the invitation of first-time participants Edward Cella Art+Architecture of LA and Gallery Diet of Miami. These two newcomers to the fair are joined by returning participants Volume Gallery, Chicago and Johnson Trading Gallery from New York. Design Miami/ 2014 also welcomes regular participants of the Basel fair, Galleria O., Rome, specializing in Italian twentieth century and international contemporary design, Galerie Pascal Cuisinier from Paris, with their focus on French design from the 1960s and 70s, Carwan Gallery, Beirut, emphasizing work from Western designers interpreting Middle Eastern craft and Nilufar Gallery, Milan, known for Italian postwar design.

The Miami fair and its Basel sibling have maintained strong bonds with the founding galleries that participated in that first design.05 Miami. Eleven founding galleries of the original fifteen – including the previously mentionedNilufar Gallery, Casati Gallery, Cristina Grajales Gallery, Demisch Danant, Galerie kreo, Galerie Patrick Seguin, Jousse Entreprise, LAFFANOUR- Galerie Downtown, Magen H Gallery, R & Company and Hostler Burrows – will beparticipating in Design Miami/ 2014.

Zesty Meyers, Principal of R & Company, New York commented, “I think what we’ve accomplished in ten years is amazing. Design Miami/ and Design Miami/ Basel have brought a global audience to us: because of them, I don’t know what languages will be spoken in my gallery today. The power of acting under the Design Miami/ umbrella as a group of galleries attracts buyers that we’d never attract individually – we keep on getting first time buyers. Because of the clients we have through Design Miami/, we can invest in scholarship and research; we can publish major books and hold museum shows. At a certain point, these pieces we are selling from the twentieth century will be gone –we’re saving history with these works, and creating future history with the contemporary.”

NEW INITIATIVES
Equally excited by the future as it is inspired by the past, Design Miami/ is launching two new forward-looking initiatives this year: the exhibition strand Design Curio, and the Design Visionary award. Conceived as contemporary cabinets of curiosity, the four independently curated Design Curio booths scattered throughout the fair will take the widest possible view of design practice. They will go beyond the scope of collectible design to embrace diverse fields from science and technology, to handcraft,and from unrealized prototypes to esoteric collections.
The show is open December 3-7, 2014 and is located on 19th Street & Meridian Avenue. For more information, visit www.designmiami.com


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