At Miami Art Week, Serpentine Toasts a Multitude of Milestones

As guests sipped on coffee and mimosas and enjoyed Casa Tua’s lavish breakfast hors d’oeuvres in its impeccably decorated Italian-style country house, Korek and Ulrich Obrist gave a special toast to express their gratitude for the numerous friends, supporters, and creative visionaries in attendance. These included Ralph Nauta, Dustin Yellin, Miles Greenberg, Isolde Brielmaier, JR, Destinee Ross-Sutton, Germane Barnes, Yinka Ilori, Klaus Biesenbach, Nina Surel, Jewel, Jeanne Greenberg Rohatyn, Dee Dee Sides, Phoebe Saatchi Yates, Abby Bangser, José Parlá, and many more.

Lauren Halsey, however, was the woman of the hour. Her just-published monograph, which was designed in an eye-catching green by the late Virgil Abloh’s design studio Alaska Alaska, arrives as the most thorough publication to date about the award-winning artist. The generously illustrated tome features contributions from the likes of poet Will Alexander, art historian LeRonn Brooks, and musician George Clinton, as well as an extensive conversation between Halsey and Serpentine’s chief curator Lizzie Carey-Thomas and Ulrich Obrist.

Halsey’s practice is deeply inspired by South Central Los Angeles, where she and her family have resided for generations, and whose signs and symbols manifest in her massive multi-room installations and immersive outdoor environments. These icons of pride and resilience within the Black community often mingle with Egyptian iconography—take last year’s commission for the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s Iris and B. Gerald Cantor Roof Garden, which Halsey transformed into a 22-foot-tall ceramic structure resembling an ancient Egyptian-style temple. Carved on its walls were graffiti tags, images pulled from Black-owned businesses, and street signage from South Central. After the installation closed, it embarked on a countrywide journey to the artist’s Summaeverythang community center in her hometown. 

After the festivities drew to a close, guests headed around the corner en masse to the Miami Beach Convention Center for the exclusive VIP preview of Art Basel Miami Beach.

See more photos from the event below.