Although on opposite ends of the country, Detroit and Miami both are home to distinctive voices telling stories in unique urban environments. Through paintings and photography, artists from these cities give us a view of corners often over-looked. In this group show, curator Larry Ossei-Mensah of Detroit’s MOCAD mixes works by Detroit artists with those from MIami to “map” urban trajectories for this “Road” series. Works by Miami artists include a stunning photo of women wearing white standing on the sand in the historically black Virginia Key Beach from Johanne Rahaman; a quiet scene of empty plastic chairs in front of a botanica from Monica Sorelle and a distorted painting of an African-American soldier from Farley Aguilar. “Each artist brings a unique point of view that engages a variety of topics,” writes Ossei-Mensah in the show’s notes, “from new and contemporary interpretations of history to confronting day-to-day concerns that affect us all as human beings on this planet.”
