Artist and filmmaker Sasha Wortzel has an installation on display at Miami Beach’s Oolite Arts – entitled “Dreams of Unknown Islands” – that dwells on what emerges when life comes untethered from quotidian patterns.
It’s the perfect fit for 2021, after a year that taught us all about daily rhythms disrupted and lives placed on hold.
“When things are so constantly disrupted, one may feel in free fall,” says Wortzel, a South Florida native who lives in Miami Beach. “It could be that you are falling, and the world is also falling, so you would think everything is static, but it also awry. The pandemic exacerbated this sensation for most of us.”
The installation, on display through April 4, starts on the first floor of the Lincoln Road gallery. A long, glass vitrine bathed in a golden glow lines the hallway, and “A Litany for Survival” – by African-American poet Audre Lorde – coats the wall.
The poem’s opening reads:
“For those of us who live at the shoreline
standing upon the edges of decision
crucial and alone … ”
“She is one of my favorite poets that I returned to at the beginning of the pandemic,” Wortzel says