The space in between features the work of four artists in residence at Bakehouse, Rose Marie Cromwell, Diana Espin, Mateo Serna Zapata, and Clara Toro, who explore the production of images through stories allied with geography: an abandoned house down Route 66, a vast mountain of fresh snow in Alaska, the abstracted curve of the dancer’s body, and the rubble of a dilapidated building in La Habana. For these artists, photography becomes a way to navigate the physicality of a place bound to the personal stories and narratives that exist within it.
The installation of the works reveals the challenge, but also the beauty, of making manifest the space within and between, occupied and vacant. The works are not presented in groupings per artist, but as individual works in communication with each other, bridging gaps, creating connections, filling space with possibilities. I wanted to construct a constellation of images specifically suited to the uniqueness of the space. The openness of the atrium and the winding hallways offer different entry points, giving the viewer multiple opportunities to come into contact with the works.
This multiplicity of perspectives not only relates to the way the images are configured within the larger space, but also to the subject matter presented in the works themselves. Each photograph captures a person, scene, or situation that extends beyond its temporal and spatial frame. The larger grouping of photographs functions similarly, organized to encourage the viewer to make her own connections and associations. When displayed in conversation with each other, their proximity, as much as their distance from one another, gives voice previously unknowable or unreachable stories.
— Laura Novoa, Curatorial + Public Programs Associate
About the artists
Rose Marie Cromwell is a photographic and video artist whose work explores the effects of globalization on human interaction and social politics. Her first monograph, El Libro Supremo de la Suerte (2018, TIS books), was awarded the Light Work Photobook Prize. Cromwell is an awardee of a Getty Reportage Grant, a Light Work Residency, and Fulbright Scholarship. She has had solo exhibitions at the Diablo Rosso Gallery and Antitesis Gallery in Panama City and has exhibited at the Aperture Foundation, Philadelphia Photo Arts Center, and Light Work. She is frequently commissioned by The New York Times, California Sunday Magazine, Harpers, The New Yorker, and Vice.
Diana Espin has a Bachelor’s Degree from the Metropolitan University of Caracas and a Masters in Business Administration from New York University. Currently, Espin is pursuing a full-time career as a photographer. She has done documentary projects, landscape fine art photography, panoramic image projects, as well as some professional portraiture and architectural photography. She has an extended body of work related to an animal rescue project in South Florida, Another Kind of Humans.
Mateo Serna Zapata is a Colombian-born, Miami-raised photo artist. As a photographer, Serna Zapata is drawn to the exploration of the human experience. He uses his camera as a tool to navigate through conversations that develop into organic interactions between people and the environment. His work has been exhibited at MOCA, New World Gallery, Cisneros-Fontanals Art Foundation, Mindy Solomon Gallery, and the Coral Gables Museum. Mateo received his BFA from the University of Florida through New World School of the Arts.
Clara Toro graduated with a degree in Industrial Design from Universidad Pontificia Bolivariana in 1987. In 1988, she moved to Montreal and then New York, attending both Université de Montreal and Pratt Institute, taking courses towards a Master’s degree in Industrial Design and Marketing. She moved to South Florida from New York in 1992, where she pursued a career as an educator from 1996 through 2008. Over the course of the last several years, she has dedicated herself full time to the study and practice of photography. Currently, she is the Director of Roberto Mata School of Photography.
Image(s): Installation view of The space in between. Photo by Pedro Wazzan, 2020.