We visited Aventura, Florida, a city located between Miami and Fort Lauderdale. Aventura enjoys beautiful beaches, pleasant subtropical weather, a wide variety of restaurants and cafes, including Latin American cuisine, many large shopping centers, and a strong and growing contemporary art scene.
Aventura is characterized by high-rise residential towers overlooking the Canals or the ocean. The towers are part of secure gated communities that have 24-hour security, an impressive entrance lobby, and all the luxurious extras you can think of: an outdoor and indoor swimming pool, a spa for residents, gyms, tennis courts, a restaurant or restaurants and a cafe.
We stayed in a residential complex called “Williams Island,” which was built over 35 years ago and still stands the test of time. What impressed me most were the manicured gardens surrounding the buildings. Walking around the complex along the water’s edge, I didn’t find a single wilted flower! In some places, I saw orchids growing on trees and in perfect bloom. I was also amazed by the level of pampering and service that the building staff of the complex provide to their residents, for a tip of course. For example, the building staff parks your car, offers to wash it, and also takes care of bringing the car out and placing it at the entrance of the building, at your request. The staff brings packages, deliveries, and food products to your apartment. You can order a minivan shuttle to drive you around the complex from place to place or to the entrance gate, and more.
From visits and conversations with friends who live in Miami, I learned that today there are new, modern residential towers that offer many additional amenities such as movie theaters for residents, game rooms, comfortable work spaces, and even the option to bring your car up and park it on the floor, adjaacent to your apartment, rather than in an underground parking lot.
Real estate developers who had the vision to buy plots and old workshops in Aventura and Miami made a fortune selling luxury apartments to the wealthy in the United States and around the world. With the money they accumulated, they began to purchase works of art, mainly contemporary art. Many have discovered Interest in artists from Central and South America who immigrated to Florida.
The large collections of Art work require spacious space to store them, and collectors have utilized warehouses they own for this purpose. Opening the warehouses to the general public, not for profit, gives entrepreneurs a significant tax break. Thus, the art they collected in warehouses they purchased in various areas of Miami – turned out to have added value when they were converted into galleries. Of course, visitors to the exhibitions pay an entrance fee and also purchase books and catalogs in the store, and thus temporary exhibitions from the collections are presented.
I loved the warehouse exhibiting the collection of real estate developer Martin Margulies. It is a large warehouse located in Miami’s Wynwood art district. I was introduced to the artist Anselm Kiefer. Kiefer, born in 1945, is an award-winning and internationally recognized German painter and sculptor. He creates from materials such as straw, dirt, wood, clay, lead, and paint on very large canvases. His works deal with themes from the past, from Nazi Germany, and mythological figures. The events appear in a symbolic manner and he is associated with the Neo-Expressionism movement in art. Keifer is influenced by the poems of Paul Celan, and they inspire his works. Thus, his well-known painting “Margaret” is influenced by Celan’s “Death Fugue”.