Jack Pierson Returns to Miami: New Exhibition at The Bass
- wgclients01
- Sep 11
- 2 min read
The Bass Museum of Art is pleased to announce Jack Pierson: The Miami Years, on view September 24, 2025, through August 16, 2026. This is the first exhibition devoted to exploring the city’s transformative impact on Pierson’s life and work.
The Bass Museum of Art will present Jack Pierson: The Miami Years, the first exhibition dedicated to examining the influence of Miami on Pierson’s artistic development.
Jack Pierson, born in New England in the 1960s, is known for work that explores themes such as desire, memory, loss, and time. Spanning photography, sculpture, drawing, painting, film, books, and installation, his practice is rooted in emotional narratives and personal reflection. Emerging in the early 1990s alongside artists like Nan Goldin and David Armstrong, Pierson became recognized for his intimate portrayals of queer life and bohemian culture in cities including New York, Boston, Los Angeles, Provincetown, and Miami Beach.
Pierson’s work often incorporates found materials—weathered objects, repurposed signage, and thrifted furniture—while drawing on the aesthetics of punk, advertising, and popular culture. His projects for magazines and galleries are closely intertwined, reflecting consistent themes of isolation, wanderlust, escapism, and the search for meaning amid impermanence.
This exhibition focuses on Pierson’s first extended visit to Miami Beach in the winter of 1984, a period that marked both personal growth and creative exploration. At the time, Miami was undergoing a cultural transformation—its emerging art scene, eclectic nightlife, and evolving celebrity presence providing fertile ground for inspiration. This dynamic context continues to echo throughout Pierson’s work.
A centerpiece of the exhibition is ARRAY (MIAMI) (2025), a newly commissioned, large-scale collage featuring posters, poems, postcards, photographs, and works on paper. The piece reflects the artist’s longstanding engagement with themes of transience and nostalgia, filtered through the lens of his Miami experience.
Jack Pierson: The Miami Years highlights the city’s lasting impact on Pierson’s practice and situates his work within broader dialogues at the intersection of contemporary art, fashion, and culture.
For more information, visit www.thebass.org or follow @thebassmoa on social media.