Rubell Museum Announces Inaugural Installation for Its New Campus

The Rubell Museum's new campus will open on December 4, 2019 with a museum-wide installation of works that chronicle key artists, moments, and movements in vital arts centers over the past 50 years, from the East Village to Beijing, Los Angeles to Leipzig, and São Paulo to Tokyo. The inaugural exhibition encompasses more than 300 works by 100 artists, providing one of the most far-ranging museum exhibitions of contemporary art ever presented. Drawn entirely from their expansive collection of over 7,200 works by more than 1,000 artists, the exhibition features defining and seminal works by artists whom the Rubells championed as they were first emerging (often becoming the first collectors to acquire their work) and those who had been overlooked. The new Rubell Museum is located in the Allapattah neighborhood of Miami, less than a mile from its original home in Wynwood. The new space is closer to downtown and readily accessible via public transportation. 1100 NW 23 Street in Miami, Florida 33127. Enjoy Free admission courtesy of HBO during Miami Art Week hours:

Dec 4-6, 9 am - 5 pm

Dec 7-8, 10 am - 5 pm

Retracing the Rubells’ journeys to both major and emerging art centers around the world, the inaugural exhibition includes surveys of artists working in proximity to one another and deep dives into individual careers, tracing influences and revealing parallels among contemporaries and across generations. Installed within the museum’s 40 galleries and its public spaces, highlights from the installation include: 

• Works acquired by the Rubells very early in artists’ careers, including Cindy Sherman’s Untitled Film Still (#21) (1978); Jeff Koons’ New Hoover Convertible (1980); Keith Haring’s Statue of Liberty (1982);  George Condo’s K-9 Explosion (1986); Rosemarie Trockel’s Untitled (1986); Richard Prince’s Untitled (cowboy) (1987); Cady Noland’s This Piece Has No Title Yet (1989); Elizabeth Peyton’s Burkhard Riemschneider (1995); and Kerry James Marshall’s Untitled (1998-1999). 
• American painters whose work is included in the Rubells’ traveling exhibition 30 Americans, opening at the Barnes Foundation on October 27, including Nina Chanel Abney, Rashid Johnson, Henry Taylor, Hank Willis Thomas, Mickalene Thomas, Carrie Mae Weems, Kehinde Wiley, and Purvis Young. 
• A survey of German artists, with works by Isa Genzken, Anselm Kiefer, Neo Rauch, and Paloma Varga Weisz. 
• Works commissioned by the Rubells from their artist-in-residence program, including Jonathan Lyndon Chase, Lucy Dodd, Cy Gavin, Sonia Gomes, Oscar Murillo, Sterling Ruby, and Allison Zuckerman. 
• Extensive installations of contemporary Los Angeles artists, featuring works from the 1980s and early 1990s by such artists as John Baldessari, Mike Kelley, Barbara Kruger, Paul McCarthy, Catherine Opie, Charles Ray, and Kaari Upson. 
• Two immersive installations by Yayoi Kusama, including Where the Lights in My Heart Go (2016), and INFINITY MIRRORED ROOM – LET’S SURVIVE FOREVER (2017). 

“For more than 50 years we have been on an incredible mission: searching for new art and art that has been overlooked. Now, with the opening of the new Rubell Museum, we will be able to share the remarkable range of art we fell in love with along the way,” stated Mera Rubell. “Rather than presenting a single narrative or survey, we wanted to let the many voices that contribute to contemporary art speak for themselves and with each other. In retracing our steps, we hope visitors will discover, as we did, that creativity thrives where artists energize each other’s practices, and wrestle with shared issues and artmaking in new ways.”

Vero Beach Museum of Art presents Made in Germany: Art Since 1980 from the Rubell Family Collection

The Vero Beach Museum of Art presents an exciting selection of approximately sixty works selected from over 500 objects of contemporary German art drawn from the deep holdings of the renowned Rubell Family Collection in Miami, Florida. Don and Mera Rubell have established one of the first major private museums of contemporary art that has become an international model.

Neo Rauch, ‘Vorfuehrung’, oil on canvas, Courtesy of the Rubell Family Collection.

The exhibition chronicles this landmark period through cutting-edge painting, sculpture and photography from some of the most important practitioners of contemporary art. During the post-World War II era, Düsseldorf and Cologne became leading centers for contemporary art. After the fall of the Berlin Wall, both Berlin and Leipzig also emerged as important contemporary art centers. Few countries have had four major centers of contemporary art at one time.

Thomas Schütte, ‘Grosse Geister’, Courtesy of the Rubell Family Collection.

This exhibition features exceptional examples from these cities pioneering artists from the late-twentieth centuries, including Anselm Kiefer and Gerhard Richter; sculptors Isa Genzhen and Thomas Schütte; influential photographers Bernd & Hilla Becher, Thomas Demand, and Thomas Ruff; and painters Martin Kobe and Neo Rauch, among others.

David Schnell, ‘Schilder’, Courtesy of the Rubell Family Collection.

In addition, the Museum will be offering a series of interpretative exhibition inspired activities including a series of German inspired films starting October 18th at 4:30pm; a lecture by Brady Roberts Made in Germany: An Insider View on October 24th at 5:30pm; an Adult Workshop with Sara Klein and Danielle Johnson How to Look At Contemporary Art on November 16th or 17th from 1 – 4 pm; and a number of Art Talks with a VBMA docent who will offer an in-depth tour focusing on select artworks from the exhibition on October 17th, November 14th and December 12th at 12 noon. Register for lectures, films, workshops and tours online at www.vbmuseum.org

Matthias Weischer, ‘St. Ludgerus’, Courtesy of the Rubell Family Collection.

Museum admission fees apply: $10 Adults, $9 Seniors (65+); Students with ID, Youth 17 and under, Museum members, and active military with ID and their families receive free admission. Museum hours are Monday to Saturday, 10 am – 4:30 pm; and Sundays, 1 pm – 4:30 pm. The Vero Beach Museum of Art is located at 3001 Riverside Park Drive, Vero Beach, Florida 32963. Directions: From I-95 (Exit 147), from U.S. One, and Indian River Boulevard, take State Road 60 east over the Merrill Barber Bridge to beachside, turn right at first traffic light into Riverside Park.

 

Candida Höfer, ‘Kloster Mehrerau Bregenz I’, Courtesy of the Rubell Family Collection.

About the Rubell Family: Mera and Don Rubell are pioneers who discover and champion young artists, undiscovered neighborhoods and new ideas. Mera and Don first began engaging with artists, galleries, and museums in 1964 while living in New York. They moved to Miami in 1992 and, with their son Jason and daughter Jennifer, began developing hotels and an art foundation and museum to house and publicly exhibit their expanding art collection. Combining their instinct for emerging neighborhoods with aesthetic acuity and hands-on business know-how, they formed Rubell Hotels and have subsequently transformed and enlivened neighborhoods on the East Coast. They helped spearhead the transformation of South Beach in the 1990’s and their art museum, located in a former DEA warehouse, did the same for Miami’s new cultural epicenter, the Wynwood neighborhood. The Rubells were also instrumental in bringing the Art Basel art fair to Miami Beach.