September Happenings at the Bass

This September, The Bass invites you to dive into a dynamic month of art, music, film, and dialogue. From thought-provoking panel talks and live performances to immersive exhibitions and creative workshops, there's something for everyone—day or night. Highlights include Third Thursdays: Late Nights Live featuring White Elephant Group Films and cellist Guy Michel, hands-on art-making at Art After Hours, artist talks with Sarah Crowner, and new exhibitions from Isaac Julien, Charles Atlas, and more. Whether you're exploring identity through self-portraiture or experiencing groundbreaking media art, September at The Bass is your portal to creativity and conversation.

THIRD THURSDAYS: LATE NIGHTS LIVE FEATURING WEG ( WHITE ELEPHANT GROUP FILMS) THU SEPT 18 | 6–9 PM

6 PM - Doors Open | 6:30 PM - Talk Starts (1 hour)

SAVE THE DATE for Third Thursdays: Late Nights Live #atTheBass on September 18 as WEG (White Elephant Group Films) and their guest panel expand upon the anchors of The Bass’s Performing Perspectives: A Collection in Dialogue exhibition through the lens and art of filmmaking with the topic ‘The Indexicality of Performance.’

Writers, directors, actors, casting directors, and editors explore the nuances of performance. The artists will dissect the evolution of a performance from the words on the page to the final portrayal. This program will examine how ideas, themes, and emotions are exchanged between artists and their audience.

WEG is a South Florida-based collective of emerging artists creating films and community, White Elephant Group (WEG) is a team of 20+ award-winning film and digital media artists working across various artistic avenues including cinema, XR, mixed-multimedia and more to artistically address and elaborate upon the voices and experiences we’ve had coming from minority and underserved communities in South Florida. Learn more at https://www.wegfilms.com/

FREE RSVP at the link below!

Third Thursday is presented by Art Bridges Access for All. Additional support from O, Cinema. Film still courtesy of WEG and The Bass, Miami Beach.

THIRD THURSDAYS: LATE NIGHTS LIVE

FEATURING GUY MICHEL | THU SEPT 18 | 6–9 PM

SAVE THE DATE! Join us for LATE NIGHTS LIVE in Social Assembly featuring celloist Guy Michel on Thursday, September 18 from 6–9 PM.

At the age of five in Haiti, Guy began a musical journey that shaped his life. He views the cello as a vessel of limitless potential, dedicated to exploring new possibilities in entertainment and education, transcending boundaries and celebrating cultural richness.

As a member of the Recording Academy, he continues to explore and contribute to music’s evolution. From local stages to international arenas, he shares his musical vision, holding workshops to inspire the next generation. His journey celebrates the universal language of music, painting the world in harmonious colors, inviting all to join his remarkable odyssey of music, culture, and boundless possibilities.

Limited seating. Use this link to add to calendar!

Third Thursday is presented by Art Bridges Access for All. Additional support from O, Cinema.

ART ATER HOURS | REFLECTIONS OF SELF

THU SEPT 18 | 6:30–8 PM

Join us for mixed-media self portraits on our next Third Thursday! Create a self-portrait that will span time and space using collage, paint, and photography to reflect your personal identity.

September's art experience is Inspired by the Performance of Self anchor in Performing Perspectives: A Collection in Dialogue. Participants will draw inspiration from their own lives, in particular focusing on childhood, adolescence, and adulthood. Art After Hours is created for adults ages 21+ at any skill level. All artmaking materials are provided and available to take home after class! The class is $25 for museum members and $30 for nonmembers.

Register HERE!

THE BASS DIALOGUES WITH SARAH CROWNER

THU SEPT 25 | 6 PM - Doors Open | 6:30 PM - Talk Begins (45 min–1 hr)

Artist Sarah Crowner joins James Voorhies, Curator-at-Large at The Bass, for a conversation marking the opening of Faire Foyer: Sarah Crowner in Dialogue with Etel Adan, a newly commissioned exhibition that creates a setting for a formal exchange between Crowner’s work and the only monumental ceramic mural of its kind by the late Lebanese-American artist Etel Adan in the U.S.

Voorhies and Crowner will highlight the interplay between Crowner’s sculptural and spatial works and Adnan’s mural within the broader context of how abstraction, materiality, and landscape shape an exhibition’s spatial environment and viewers’ perception. To learn more about the exhibition, visit Faire Foyer: Sarah Crowner in Dialogue with Etel Adan.

Sarah Crowner lives in Brooklyn. Her diverse practice explores the spaces where geometry abuts gesture, materiality merges with composition, and the graphic confronts the handmade. Crowner’s work points to an expanded field of painting, investigating the relationship between the element and the whole, and how parts build an entirety.

Complimentary access with RSVP. Limited seating based on first-come, first-served. Link below!

ISAAC JULIEN: VAGABONDIA

NOW ON VIEW

We are pleased to announce Isaac Julien: Vagabondia, presenting the artist’s celebrated 2000 film and video installation recently gifted to The Bass’s collection by Rosa and Carlos de la Cruz, on view beginning August 20.

Sir Isaac Julien (b. 1960), KBE RA, is a British artist and filmmaker who has devoted his four-decade career to expanding the possibilities of the moving image.

Coming to prominence in 1980s London, his work—spanning film, video, and photography—combines poetic visual storytelling with critical explorations of cultural memory and the dispersion of Black individuals and communities throughout the diaspora.

Go to this link to plan your next visit!

Isaac Julien: Vagabondia is organized by Claudia Mattos, Associate Curator of New Media Art. Vagabondia is a gift from Rosa and Carlos de la Cruz. This exhibition is funded by the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation New Media Initiative, with support from Sir Isaac Julien, KBE RA, in honor of Rosa de la Cruz. Isaac Julien, Vagabondia, 2000. Installation view, Turner Prize, Tate Britain, 2001. Artwork ©Isaac Julien. Photo: ©Tate. Courtesy of the artist and Victoria Miro.

CHARLES ATLAS: HAIL THE NEW PURITAN

NOW ON VIEW

We are pleased to announce our latest exhibition Charles Atlas: Hail the New Puritan, on view now through October 19, 2025. Hail the New Puritan (1985–86) by Charles Atlas is a landmark in the history of media-based performance, offering a fictionalized documentary of a day in the life of Scottish choreographer and dancer Michael Clark.

Fusing the formal discipline of classical ballet with the raw vitality of punk, post-punk, and queer underground subcultures, Clark’s performances—and Atlas’s mock-documentary approach—broke new ground with their exploration of self-fashioned personas and the politics of style. Set against the backdrop of 1980s London, the film captures the spirit of a shifting cultural moment, where physical movement operates as both personal expression and social defiance.

Atlas’s camera acts as an extension of the performing body, crafting a visual language attuned to the energies, textures, and codes of a changing society. Nearly four decades later, Hail the New Puritan remains a vital cultural touchstone, its experimental pulse resonating across time. At The Bass, its presentation deepens a conversation already embedded within XI (2004), the immersive installation by assume vivid astro focus (avaf) currently on view on the museum’s second floor.

At the center of this constellation, Atlas’s film stands not only as a defining work of its time but as an influential force that continues to inform how artists visualize movement, stage identity, and imagine the political possibilities of performance. Look for special events and more throughout the season as The Bass continues its proud tradition of sharing powerful international contemporary art that excites, challenges, and educates audiences, bringing new perspectives to Miami Beach’s diverse cultural context.

Go to this link to plan your next visit!

Charles Atlas: Hail the New Puritan is curated by Claudia Mattos, Associate Curator of New Media Art. This exhibition is funded by the John S. and James L. Knight Foundation New Media Initiative. Hail the New Puritan, film still ©Charles Atlas. Courtesy of the artist and Luhring Augustine, New York.

THE KALEIDOSCOPIC: WRITING HISTORIES THROUGH THE COLLECTION

NOW ON VIEW

Coming up this month #atTheBass... The Kaleidoscopic: Writing Histories Through the Collection, on view August 20.

The Kaleidoscopic: Writing Histories Through the Collection reimagines The Bass’s permanent collection as a dynamic, evolving archive. Rather than presenting history as fixed or linear, the exhibition embraces its shifting, fragmented nature.

The Kaleidoscopic invites visitors to engage with the collection as a living, multivocal space where meanings change over time and histories are continuously written, rewritten, and righted.

Go to this link to plan your next visit!

This exhibition was organized by Claudia Mattos, Associate Curator of New Media Art. This exhibition is made possible with generous support from Myriad Canada. Michael Snow, SSHTOORRTY, 2005. Collection of The Bass.

FAIRE FOYER: SARAH CROWNER IN DIALOGUE WITH ETEL ADNAN

NOW ON VIEW

The Bass is greeting August with a brand-new season of art exhibitions! We are pleased to announce Faire Foyer: Sarah Crowner in Dialogue with Etel Adnan on view August 20, 2025 through July 26, 2026.

The exhibition brings together new work by the artist Sarah Crowner and a monumental ceramic mural by Etel Adnan, the only example of its kind in the United States.

Crowner, whose practice engages geometric abstraction across painting, sculpture, and design, creates a semicircular carpeted alcove—or in French faire foyer—a welcoming transitional space connecting the exterior to the home's interior—that frames Adnan's mural.

Sarah Crowner is an American artist whose work with geometric abstraction blurs the boundaries between painting, sculpture, set design, and ceramics. Exploring the formal language of abstraction with simplicity and intuition, her ongoing experiments in site-responsive installations revisit and reimagine the legacies of modernist art and architecture.

Go to this link to plan your next visit!

Organized by James Voorhies, The Bass Curator at Large. This exhibition is made possible with generous support from the Arison Arts Foundation and PHILLIPS. Sarah Crowner, Stone 1 (Small), 2024. © Sarah Crowner. Courtesy of the artist, Luring Augustine, New York, and Galerie Nordenhake, Berlin, Mexico City, and Stockholm.

ASSUME VIVID ASTRO FOCUS: XI

NOW ON VIEW

The Bass is pleased to present the exhibition assume vivid astro focus: XI, an enveloping installation spanning floor to ceiling that features densely patterned wallpaper, multicolored seating, a modular stage, digital decals, sculptures that shapeshift into performative stage elements, and a large-scale projection covering an entire wall. Now on view, the exhibition is a collaborative work, bringing together individual pieces by assume vivid astro focus (avaf) as well as an array of collaborations and contributions by General Idea, Honeygun Labs, Natalja Kent, Michael Lazarus, Los Super Elegantes, Carla Machado, Justin Samson, Marco Boggio Sella, and Pete Woods.

The São Paulo–based multidisciplinary art collective fuses drawing, sculpture, video and performance into large-scale installations and happenings where gender, politics and cultural codes freely interact. Inhabiting the social forms of discos and dance parties, avaf invites museum visitors to engage with the exhibition environment, creating lived experiences that contribute to the continually evolving social dynamics inherent in their work.

Visit this link to learn more!

This exhibition is organized by Claudia Mattos, Associate Curator of New Media Art. Installation view of assume vivid astro focus: XI. Photography by Zaire Aranguren. Courtesy of The Bass, Miami Beach and The de la Cruz collection.

BASS BABIES

THE CREATIVITY CENTER | THURSDAYS & SATURDAYS | 11 AM–12 PM

Bass Babies is BACK beginning Thursday, September 11 from 11 AM–12 PM at The Creativity Center!

Join us at The Bass Creativity Center for a weekly art program designed for our youngest visitors–aged 2 through 4–and their caregivers to foster new discoveries in sensory awareness, creativity and pre-literacy skills through hands-on art activities.

Each week, students will learn about colors, shapes, patterns, numbers and letters while exercising free expression. This practice aids in problem solving, assists in decision-making, and provides a creative outlet for early learners.

Led by teaching artist, Paloma Dueñas these multidisciplinary and sensory sessions are designed for toddlers to learn basic concepts of art and artists through the exploration of art and music.

Registration info available at this link!

Photography by Monica McGivern. Courtesy of The Bass Miami Beach.

THE STUDIO

THE CREATIVITY CENTER | SAT & SUN | 12:30–4:30 PM

Have you visited The Studio at The Bass Creativity Center? Newly renovated, explore a space for your imagination to run wild. Join us on weekends for Studio Drop-Ins at The Bass Creativity Center from 12:30–4:30 PM.

Take a break during your next museum visit and drop in for self-guided art-making activities, design challenges, books, and more!

Visit this link to learn more!

By ML Staff. Courtesy/The Bass Museum of Art