“Aerial Vision,” the latest exhibition at The Wolfsonian-FIU in Miami Beach, is all about point of view.
Or, as curator Lea Nickless puts it, “how you look at things from different perspectives and how that has an impact.
The idea of the exhibition is how the early 20th-century technologies of skyscrapers and airplanes provided a previously unavailable platform to see and interpret the world.”
On display through April 24, the exhibition utilizes paintings, prints, drawings, magazine covers, postcards, sheet music, collector plates and other objects to show how these inventions gave birth to a new era that was born practically overnight.
“This new view affected everyone … artists, architects, urban planners and designers,” said Nickless, adding that it sparked creativity and introduced novel approaches for living, working and traveling. “Everything in the exhibition is a result of an interpretation of this new view by a visual thinker.”
(Roldan Torres)
Mitchell “Micky” Wolfson Jr. at The Wolfsonian-FIU.
Many times through the years, Nickless says she kept encountering items from The Wolfsonian’s collection that reflected a point of view, such as classic airline posters that showed the view from above and other pieces with a perspective from below.
“Suddenly,” she said, “you are looking at the world in a different way.”
In tandem with how museum founder Mitchell “Micky” Wolfson Jr. himself views his objects – he’s interested in what he says is the “narration of the pieces” he collects, not just the individual items – Nickless kept returning to the concept of creating a perspectives exhibition.
Together with Richard Miltner, exhibition designer at The Wolfsonian, they arranged approximately 165 works from the collection into nine chapters: Aerial Art, The Sky’s the Limit, Urban Heights, Selling the View, Portraits of Power, Every Roof an Airport, Heightened Anxiety, A New Domain and Free Falling.
(Courtesy of Lynton Gardiner)
The 14-foot rendering of the Waldorf-Astoria Hotel (circa 1929) by Lloyd Morgan for architects Schultze & Weaver has never been shown publicly at The Wolfsonian-FIU, but it is one of the highlights of the “Aerial Vision” exhibition now on display through April 26, 2022.
“Aerial Vision” pays close attention to detail, including Miltner’s design of the space.
“For me, I like to say it’s not about my design, but looking at the objects and interpreting it that way,” he said. “I did pick up on how there are specific shapes that are used (in the works), such as the architecture.”
The exhibition showcases some of The Wolfsonian’s one-of-a-kinds, including art deco bronze elevator doors from a Boston hotel circa 1929; a copper spire from the 29th floor of the Woolworth Building, which was the world’s tallest skyscraper from 1913 to 1930; an oversized beer glass with skyscraper imagery promoting Ohio’s tallest glass of beer; and two realty-scape paintings, one of which was commissioned by the Greater Miami Development Co. to promote land sales in South Florida.
One of the most important pieces, Nickless says, is a 14-foot-tall watercolor rendering, circa 1929, of New York’s Waldorf-Astoria Hotel.
“We have never shown it before because of its dimensionality,” she said.
Almost 100% of the pieces are from Wolfson’s personal collection. (At age 82, he says he continues to collect every day and has no intention of stopping.)
Three pieces are from Wolfsonian staff members who are also collectors: two vintage photographs of Miami by Richard B. Hoit from development director Michael Hughes, and a 1955 aerial map of Miami and Miami Beach from accounting coordinator Larry Wiggins.
Selecting the pieces for “Aerial Vision” was a difficult task, Nickless says, and the exhibition features just half of what was on her original checklist because of space constraints, among other issues.
“The material is rich and deep. There is so much,” she said.
In effect, the exhibition is a result of Nickless’ ever-evolving views of the pieces in The Wolfsonian collection, which she says today numbers 200,000 items and counting. It’s not a stretch to say that she has an encyclopedic knowledge of the collection. She began working as an assistant at Wolfson’s first gallery in 1984, at what was then known as Miami Dade Community College.
“It was called the Mitchell Wolfson Jr. Collection of Decorative and Propaganda Arts,” she recalled.
In 1997, Wolfson gifted his Mediterranean Revival-style Washington Storage Co. building on Washington Avenue to Florida International University. The gift included about 70,000 items, which Wolfson had amassed from his expeditions throughout the world. There’s also a library with about 50,000 rare books, periodicals and other reference materials.
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(Courtesy of Lynton Gardiner)
A 1937 chandelier by architect Kjell Westin for the Norma Restaurant, Odenplan, Stockholm, Sweden, has transportation images etched in glass.
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(Courtesy of Lynton Gardiner)
A portrait of futurist painter and aviator Albino Siviero by Italian artist Renato Di Bosso, painted in 1940, imagines Siviero in an airplane cockpit.
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(Courtesy of Lynton Gardiner)
This anti-war painting by Virginia Berresford, titled “Air Raid II” (1937-1938), depicts a woman’s outstretched hand gesturing skyward in defiance of incoming bombers.
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(Courtesy of Lynton Gardiner)
American architect Cass Gilbert’s plant-like copper finial from the 29th floor of the Woolworth Building in New York, donated to The Wolfsonian-FIU by the Rockefeller family.
With expansion plans underway at The Wolfsonian, there will eventually be triple the space to show off the massive and continually growing collection. The new space, slated for completion by late 2026 or early 2027, is expected to add 35,000 square feet, according to Casey Steadman, director of the museum.
More space means more opportunities to display what’s now kept in storage, as well as any of Wolfson’s new finds.
“Each,” he said, “are a part of a great chapter in this book of objects.”
If You Go
“Aerial Vision”
Now through April 24, 2022
Wednesday, Thursday, Saturday & Sunday: 10 a.m. – 6 p.m.
Friday, 10 a.m. – 9 p.m.
The Wolfsonian-FIU
1001 Washington Ave.
Miami Beach
General admission, $12; seniors, students with ID and children 6-18, $8
For more information, call 305.531.1001 or visit Wolfsonian.org.
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