September Programming at The Wolf

Fall is (almost) here, so we’re off to the races at The Wolfsonian–FIU with a busy season of programming! Launching September is Hollywood in Havana (9/8), a collaboration with Miami Beach Film Society that pairs a Wolfsonian tour of our Cuban graphic art installation with a screening and director Q&A at O Cinema South Beach of the documentary Errol Flynn’s Ghost. Then, we’re dialing things up to 11 with The Wolf on Wax (9/20), a vinyl night and open-spin dance party that’ll have Miami reveling in nostalgia. Plus, don’t let your audience miss out on At Home in the Machine Age (9/26), a virtual look inside an iconic International Style home, New York’s High Ridge Richard H. Mandel House.

PUBLIC PROGRAMS

Sun, Sep 8 | 4–6:30pm (4pm tour + 5pm film)

Hollywood in Havana

In the 1940s and ’50s, Havana’s love affair with Hollywood saw movie stars like Ava Gardner, Marlon Brando, and Gary Cooper flock to the Caribbean—and immortalize the tropical island’s paradise and pleasures on the silver screen. Spot visiting celebrity caricatures through a 4pm tour of The Wolfsonian’s latest installation of work by 20th-century graphic artist Conrado W. Massaguer, then walk across the street to O Cinema South Beach (1130 Washington Ave) for a 5pm showing of Errol Flynn’s Ghost: Hollywood in Havana and Q&A with director Gaspar González. The 2018 documentary follows the history of the American cinema craze in Cuba to one actor’s mountaintop meeting with a young Fidel Castro before the Revolution. Presented in partnership with Miami Beach Film Society.

$11; FREE* for MBC and Wolfsonian members, seniors, and students | Tickets
*Optional tour of Cuban Caricature and Culture at The Wolf is included in the film admission price.

Fri, Sep 13 | 6–9pm

Second Shift

It’s SoBe’s best-kept nightlife secret: when the other happy hours wind down, we keep the killer specials going! For a sophisticated date night that will be kind on your wallet, pencil in a stop at The Wolf. First take a free guided tour of the galleries at 6pm, then head downstairs to the Design Store for half-priced beer, wine, and mixed drinks. After pregaming with our one-two punch of culture and cocktails, you’ll be right in the heart of the action only a couple of blocks from Ocean Drive—perfectly situated to hit the town in style.

Free and open to the public; drinks available for purchase

Fri, Sep 20 | 6:30–9pm

The Wolf on Wax

Audiophiles, listen up! Dust off your favorite LPs and dream up your ultimate throwback playlist for a “retro remix” night designed just for music lovers. Journey into the world of vintage vinyl and old-school record players with Wolfsonian chief librarian Frank Luca, then take to the lobby to hit the turntables for an open-spin dance party with Miami’s own Vinyl Social Club.

$12, free for members | Tickets

Thu, Sep 26 | 7–8pm

At Home in the Machine Age

Join us on a virtual walkthrough of one of architecture’s International Style gems! Wolfsonian curator Shoshana Resnikoff and William Sofield, owner of the High Ridge Richard H. Mandel House, will lead a photo tour and discussion of Bill’s incredible 1934 home in Bedford Hills, New York. A collaboration between architect Edward Stone Durell and interior designer Donald Deskey—the same duo behind NYC’s elegant Radio City Music Hall!—the Mandel House is a masterpiece of modular form, minimal ornament and color, and flat planes. Follow the home’s journey from its early beginnings as a personal estate to its later transformations into a nursing home and private residence in this rare peek inside a prime example of the “architecture of the machine age.”

Presented as part of The Wolfsonian’s Mark Mamolen program series on American homes, investigating how the design of living space powerfully expresses individual personality and social values.

Free and open to the public | RSVP

Fri, Sep 27 | 7–8:30pm

Sketching in the Galleries

Tap into your inner artist by sketching in our galleries! Drawing materials, gallery stools, and professional bilingual instruction provided to participants of all ages and skill levels. English/Spanish

Free and open to the public; walk-in basis, no RSVP required

Weekly on Fri | 6–6:45pm

Free Friday Guided Tours

Learn more about The Wolfsonian and related art and design themes during a 45-minute free guided tour of the building, collection, or exhibitions. New guides bring different perspectives each week!

Free and open to the public

EXHIBITIONS + INSTALLATIONS

Through Feb 2
Cuban Caricature and Culture: The Art of Massaguer
With his biting political satire, celebrity caricatures, and magazine and advertising illustrations, graphic artist Conrado Walter Massaguer (1889–1965) helped shape the visual culture of his native Cuba between the 1920s and 1950s. This installation of works recently gifted to The Wolfsonian Library by Vicki Gold Levi will bring forth Massaguer’s legacy through dozens of works, from images of the “New Woman” flapper ideal (the so-called “Massa-girls”) in his magazine Social to depictions of tropical paradise for the Cuban Tourist Commission. Massaguer’s transnational reach will be shown in his covers for Collier’s and Life, while cartoons of visiting dignitaries and Hollywood stars will reveal how he rubbed shoulders with Franklin D. Roosevelt, Walt Disney, Albert Einstein, and the King of Spain—all evidence of an artist at the center of Havana’s cosmopolitan culture in the decades before the Cuban Revolution.

NEW! Through January 26

Caricaturas
Caricature combines portraiture with satirical wit and style. In conjunction with Cuban Caricature and Culture, our installation about Conrado Walter Massaguer—one of the leading practitioners of the form in Latin America—this display from our library collection presents works of his contemporaries from Mexico and his native Cuba, where caricature was especially vital in the early and mid-twentieth century, promoting celebrity culture and contributing to political critique. The caricatures on display include such revered and reviled world leaders as President Eisenhower, Queen Elizabeth II, Fulgencio Batista, Fidel Castro, Benito Mussolini, and Adolf Hitler; celebrities like George Bernard Shaw, Sarah Bernhardt, Enrico Caruso, Diego Rivera, and Charlie Chaplin; and portraits and self-portraits of famous caricaturists like Miguel Covarrubias and Xavier Cugat.

EXTENDED! Through September 30
Cover Girls
The brainchild of publisher, illustrator, and art director Conrado W. Massaguer, Social set the tone for Cuban values and taste in the early 20th century. From the 1920s into the 1950s the influential magazine launched the careers of numerous Cuban artists and popularized a bold Art Deco aesthetic, particularly in its depictions of young women—flapper types who showed off the fashion, makeup, and hairstyle trends of the time.

Many of Massaguer’s original Social covers are displayed in Cuban Caricature and Culture: The Art of Massaguer, an installation of recent gifts by collector Vicki Gold Levi to The Wolfsonian Library. Shown along the museum’s 10th Street facade is just a taste of these covers, presented alongside two of Miami artist Andres Conde’s contemporary reinterpretations of Massaguer’s historic “ideals.” More work by Conde will be featured in Deco Fashion: Painted Illustration, an exhibition opening September 19, 2019, at the Art Deco Museum located just two blocks away from The Wolfsonian on Ocean Drive.

Ongoing
Deco: Luxury to Mass Market
“Art Deco” has come to evoke a set of styles that emerged in the 1920s and 1930s out of aspirations to fuse art and industry into a modern language of design. From exquisite handcrafted objects to streamlined household appliances, the items on display in Deco will demonstrate how American designers adapted a style associated with European luxury to the demands of industrial mass production. Through decorative arts, product design, architecture, and graphics from the Wolfsonian collection, the exhibition will trace Art Deco’s origins in Europe, its migration to the United States, and its evolution into a fully American style—perhaps most spectacularly realized on Miami Beach in the 1930s.

Deco: Luxury to Mass Market is made possible by Diane and Alan Lieberman and the South Beach Group, with the support of Jamestown, L.P., and Saul and Jane Gross and Streamline Properties.

Ongoing
Art and Design in the Modern Age: Selections from the Wolfsonian Collection
These galleries provide an overview of the museum’s holdings of American and European artifacts from 1850 to 1950. Culled from The Wolfsonian collection are approximately three hundred works in a variety of formats, ranging from books, posters, and postcards to decorative arts, architectural models, paintings, and sculptures. Focal points include design reform movements, urbanism, industrial design, transportation, world’s fairs, advertising, and political propaganda. Inaugurated in November 1996, this ongoing exhibition is periodically updated.

The Wolfsonian is located at 1001 Washington Avenue, Miami Beach, FL. Admission is $12 for adults; $8 for seniors, students, and children ages 6–18; and free for Wolfsonian members, State University System of Florida staff and students with ID, and children under 6. The museum is open Monday, Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday, 10am–6pm; Friday, 10am–9pm; Sunday, noon–6pm; and is closed on Wednesday.