Yesterday we visited the Arquipélago — Centro de Artes Contemporâneas in Ribeira Grande on the northern part of the island. Originally the Ribeira Grande Distillation Factory, the site dates back to the late 19th century. Construction on the original buildings began in 1893 and the first export of alcohol was reported in 1896. However, production was short lived.
In 1901, due to pressures from the Portuguese mainland, a protectionist measure was put in place capping alcohol production across the Azorean islands to 2 million liters per year — a drop from 10 million liters per year. The mainland simply couldn't compete with low-cost alcohol from the islands and so they complained. This crippled the local industry and the factory shut down shortly after.
Subsequent to this, the site was repurposed for tobacco drying and storage, and even served as military barracks for a period of time. Then in 2006, the property was purchased by the Azorean government and, using money from the EU's Regional Development Fund, it was remade into what is now fittingly referred to as a "factory of culture."
The architects for the project were João Mendes Ribeiro and Menos é Mais Arquitectos, and if you ever find yourself on São Miguel, I would highly recommend you visit the center. The architects did a wonderful job creating a cohesive dialogue between the old (constructed out of black volcanic basalt) and the new. It was recommended to me and now I'm recommending it to all of you.
This December 4 (2019) -- the day before Art Basel starts -- the Rubell family will open a new 100,000 square foot museum in Miami's Allapattah district. (For years people have been calling Allapattah the new Wynwood.)
A former industrial space on a 2.5 acre lot, the building was renovated by New York-based Selldorf Architects. Just over half of the building has been allocated to exhibition space and about 65% of this will be for permanent/longer-term collections.
The Rubell family started collecting contemporary art in 1965. At the time, they were living in New York City. In 1990 they moved to Miami and in 1993 they opened up the "Rubell Family Collection" in Wynwood, which was a depressed neighborhood up until probably the early 2000s.
With over 7,200 works, it is now one of the largest privately owned and publicly accessible contemporary art collections in the world. If you live in Miami or you happen to find yourself there this winter, you may want to check out the new Rubell Museum.
Rendering: Selldorf Architects
For this year’s Art Basel Miami Beach, artist Carsten Höller collaborated with Fondazione Prada to create a 3-night-only pop-up club called, The Prada Double Club Miami.
By time you read this post, the pop-up is likely to be over. But it is an interesting space nonetheless.
The installation made use of an old 1920s film studio and was comprised of two distinct spaces – hence the double club reference.
The interior bar and dance floor were entirely monochromatic.
Höller wanted all color to instead come from participants within the space.
The exterior bar, on the other hand, was “hyper-polychromatic.”
Perhaps some of you might find inspiration here for your next condo sales office. That would be fun.
Photography: Casey Kelbaugh, courtesy of Fondazione Prada and via The Spaces