Amid the glitz and spectacle of Art Week, a new mural festival in Miami's historic Little Havana is striving to make sure homegrown artists don't get overlooked.
The is spearheaded by hip hop education nonprofit and Daniel Fila. The Miami artist, also known as Krave, already platforms local talent at , his incubation space for creators.
The new festival was originally going to be a micro-fair on one of El Fresco's regular weekly slots in December, but as more events and partnerships emerged in the run-up to Art Week Krave's team decided they could curate and host a bigger festival.
Events like Secret Walls, a live painting competition, will highlight the neighborhood and the talent it harbors.
鈥淚t is unfortunate that a lot of what's happening here year-round and the people that are participating year-round are overlooked,鈥� he said. 鈥淎nd I'm one of them 鈥� I've never been in Art Basel or any of the major art fairs, but now look, we're making one.鈥�
Raymond Adrian, aka Gemz, has known Krave since they were in 9th grade together, tagging walls and doing graffiti art. Gemz is the creative director at the Perez Art Museum Miami, and always comes to help out Krave because he pushes for local art.
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He straddles the line between established high-value art and local, community-oriented art. He says that money and galleries have divided the two sectors, as people come looking to flip art for sales instead of fostering artists and collectives.
This leads to people making art for profit and not for the sake of art itself.
鈥淎nd that starts to dilute local artists,鈥� he said. 鈥淚t鈥檚 almost like the housing market, but with art.鈥�
Gina, also known as La Fibra, says spaces like El Fresco and the Littlest Art Fair are so important circumvent the focus on monetization and give artists, especially newer ones like herself, a platform.
鈥溾�奣he monetization of creativity happens with big festivals like Basel, where you pay thousands of dollars to get a booth, and you may not even sell your artwork,鈥� she said. 鈥淲hat you're doing is instead of proving your creative value or expressing yourself creatively, what you end up doing is鈥� proving that your work is worthy of being sold and making people money.鈥�
For Krave, the Littlest Art Fair is the culmination of the last two years of El Fresco and Vinyl Tuesdays. He鈥檚 proud that they鈥檝e been able to build an ever-growing group in Little Havana through grassroots methods.
鈥淪o now it's no longer, 鈥楬ey, will you put me on,'" he said. 鈥淚t's like, 'No, we'll put everybody on'鈥� there's no 鈥榥o鈥� at our doorstep.鈥�
The Littlest Art Fair will have a Vinyl Tuesday neighborhood jam, a mural walk through Little Havana, and a discussion about AI and art, among other events.
IF YOU GO
What: Littlest Art Fair
When: Miami Art Week, December 2-6
Where: El Fresco, 535 SW 12th Ave, Miami, FL 33130, and other locations in Little Havana
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