Leifheit takes the story of Robert the Doll—that of an older man carrying around an effigy of his younger self dressed in a little sailor suit—and reinterprets it as a tongue-in-cheek queer story. Leifheit’s photographs meld history with autobiography and commentary on queer culture. The result offers a celebration of different relationships, and a new take on an old story.

Vogel’s fiber art serves as a reflection of and response to her natural world, finding deeper meaning in basic shapes through mindful slow stitching and beading. Each piece celebrates the beautifully unusual arrangements designed by nature.

Doughty’s series of alphabet self-portraits began with an “A” in 1999 and finished with a “Z” in 2017. The complete series shows an exploration of personal mythology, archetypes, and the differences between writing and visual imagery.

Baldridge focuses on using the power of art to bring awareness to the mounting threats of flooding and sea level rise with the goal of inspiring our community to unify in solving these issues. Large abstract seascape paintings that portray sea states from the perfect tranquil snorkel day to the powerful waves borne on a storm are displayed alongside sculptural figures covered with elevation maps reinforcing the immediacy of the crisis at hand.

Everyone’s favorite miniature parade returns! Artists compete for cash prizes and bragging rights with pint-sized floats to suit this year’s Fantasy Fest theme: Cult Classics and Cartoon Chaos! Past year’s fantastical entries are on view all month, and be sure to catch this years’ designs as they are auctioned off in everyone’s favorite pint-sized parade on Oct 22 in the Helmerich Theater.

We close out the season with a celebration of the fruit that brings us joy – like holding sunshine in the palm of your hand – and an annual reminder of why we love our island home. In the same spirit, our summer group exhibition is a celebration of the creativity all around us, as our family of artist members share the fruits of their labors (mango-inspired or otherwise), with something for every taste.

Hird, a painter, stage designer and award-winning filmmaker uses the mythical garden as a metaphor to explore how we perceive truth. Narratives favorites familiar from her childhood are re-imagined for our present day in large-scale paintings, interactive shadowbox gardens and animated videos. Seductively, charmingly, she challenges the viewer to choose whether or not to believe.

A mermaid plays the lyre with a boat on her head. An anthropomorphized cat considers her next move. A dragon smiles with its tongue out like a happy dog. Effio’s charming raku and concrete sculptures appear like characters from a children’s book, leaping into three dimensions.

Appleby’s wall-sized cyanotype prints are juxtaposed with plants, oolite and found objects in an immersive installation meant to have you gaze again at the world around you, with praise, consideration and collaborative energy.

Miami artist Meme Ferré’s abstract works unite a vibrant natural color palette reminiscent of her Caribbean heritage and the tropical, lush flora and fauna from her garden in Puerto Rico. Ferré believes her artistic gifts should be shared, inspiring her latest body of work, an homage of portraits that capture the essence of her friends and loved one’s personalities.

Trained as a furniture maker by master craftsmen, and as a folk quilter by his grandmother and other artists, San Francisco-based artist William Rhodes uses his talents and empathy to give voice to African American histories and communities before they are lost to time. His exquisite wooden sculptures incorporate neon slogans, historic photos, and other ephemera. His fiber works include a pair of quilts made in Fall 2021 with members of Key West’s Bahama Village community.

German artist Heidi Theissen fell in love with Key West in the 1980s and never fell out. Her tender series of dreamlike paintings on found wood pieces – mostly of people and scenes from Bahama Village – combine the virtuosity of a renaissance artist with the strange directness of folk art.

Burnham’s maximalist installation of folded, layered and intertwined drawings is like stepping into a pop-up comic book that’s as disorienting as it is exhilarating. Burnham is based in Maryland, where she is a tenured professor, and boasts a resume of exhibitions and collections across the country and beyond.

Writer, comic, fashionista and stealth tricyclist Kevin Assam takes phrases overheard at parties, gay bars and dubious back alleys, then prints them in neon colors like a modern-day Warhol, finding poetry in the absurd.

Koenig’s ambitious, meticulous, fantastical paintings and works on paper are inspired by her close study of eastern spirituality and Jungian philosophy. Monkeys, elephants and peacock feathers are fused into kaleidoscopes of color and pattern, offering themselves as guides to a higher consciousness.

On the eve of Key West’s 200th anniversary, we celebrate two of the ingredients in our island’s secret sauce: our cultural roots in Cuba, and our arguably irrational love of baseball! A who’s who of Key West and Cuba’s most accomplished artists celebrate America’s pastime, at The Studios and other venues.

Combining assemblage and encaustic wax painting techniques, Kostmayer’s latest shadowboxes draw on architectural elements – mouldings, finials, railings, and more – in a series of abstract compositions that are as gently loving as they are elegant.

For over fifty years, Judith Murray and Robert Yasuda have been highly respected proponents of abstract painting in New York, throughout the United States, and internationally. During that time, they’ve spent part of the year in the fabled neighborhood of SoHo New York and the rest of the time in the Florida Keys. In their first exhibition in Key West, Murray will present vividly painted canvases that emphasize her sculptural brushwork alongside Yasuda’s shaped and carved panels of subtly modulated colors.

In her recent works on paper, Tyler Buckheim Trosset reaches across time to touch the past, combining the tactility of rubbings from liquor bottles and monuments with tightly rendered graphite drawings based on historic photos of fishing boats and discarded military ID’s.

The most exciting auction of the year is also one of the year’s best group exhibitions, with a carefully curated roster of veteran and emerging Keys artists. As ever, 100% of the proceeds benefit artists, both directly to the ones on auction, and through grants by the Anne McKee Artists Fund.

For well over a year, against a backdrop of headlines consumed by the pandemic, Ohio-based printmaker Nicholas Hill has scanned the paper each day for people glimpsed in the backgrounds of news photos, then foregrounded them as raw, brush and ink drawings across the paper’s surface.

Known as an illustrator of children’s books, with over 40 years of titles under his belt, Christopher Santoro’s seemingly effortless range extends to elegant abstractions, witty design, and tightly rendered visual puns that just might make you snort with laughter.

The sure-handed and well-loved Director of Fine Arts at College of the Florida Keys is also one of the area’s strongest ceramicists, with a collection of recent work combining organic and abstract forms in her distinct style.

Ballast Key is a backcountry island seven miles west of Key West. It was owned by David Wolkowsky, a friend of Tennessee Williams and Truman Capote. Wolkowsky died recently at 99. Under the guidance of the Nature Conservancy, the island was donated to the National Wildlife Refuge system to become a backcountry research station. South of Southernmost is a photography project that documents the arc of the island’s story as it reorients from the human to the wild.

Whether you’re assembling marks on a canvas, curating a tropical garden, or prioritizing the people that matter most to you, sometimes the best way to get at the big picture is to take it one piece at a time. For this year’s open members’ exhibition, we invite artists to join The Studios in taking it easy and being kind to ourselves, by focusing on the little things.

Key West in the 1960s to the 1980s was a special time, even by Key West standards. Rita Troxel captures the era’s freewheeling glow in a curated selection of stories and photographs from her book “Home at the End of the World”, told in the voices of the people who lived it.

This past June and July, a group of watercolor enthusiasts met each night at the beach, just before sunset, with paints, brushes and open imaginations. Led by beloved Key West-New York artist Susan Sugar, the students learned new ways of observing the ephemeral shapes and transitory moods of the evening sky.

One of our favorite painters takes us on a journey to an imaginary paradise on earth where exotic people and colorful creatures live side by side in sublime harmony.

The Smallest Parade in the Universe
Everyone’s favorite miniature parade returns! Artists compete for cash prizes and bragging rights with pint-sized floats to suit this year’s Fantasy Fest theme: All-A Daze for a Holiday! The fantastical entries are on view all month before being auctioned Oct 23 to benefit MARC House.

The past year has pulled Nowak’s attention in a hundred different directions—a new gallery and a new baby, for starters. As always though, her painting practice has been a constant. With her latest endeavor JAG Gallery off the ground, which Keys Weekly describes as being “like a super cool younger sibling who somehow has clout and cred way beyond her years”, Nowak is ready to once again share her own incredible work with the community.

Katlin Spain pieces shapes of color together into large scale oil paintings influenced by her time spent in Key West. Bushes of bright flowers overflow from fenced yards, ripe fruit dangles from stems, and palms and poincianas overlap each other, covering the view above with different shades of green and vermillion.

Wild Observations explores change in wildlife corridors, combining scientific research with artistic interpretation. The paintings, installations and photo-based works featured recount ecological and cultural studies of observations occurring in our wild places. These color drenched works include mammals, birds, botany and landscapes, some layered with correlated scientific data.

Artist Kristyn LaMoia sees the world from all sides. Her inaugural Key West exhibition explores how the space we see, what we experience, is informed by our subconscious. By delving into, what she terms as, “the absurd beings of our subconscious mind”, LaMoia invites viewers to experience a surreal inner world replete with fantastic, sometimes funny inhabitants. The clean, delicate style of her work balances her perceptions of a sprawling otherworldliness.

Olga Manosalvas is known for her colorful paintings and sculptures which depict island dwellers, Mardi Gras revelers and voodoo queens with a distinct voice of the tropics. Her latest works explore a more monochromatic plane, capturing her figures in tones and highlighting sections of skin pigments and fabrics for added emphasis. These new color shifts provide a fresh vantage point to question the everyday.


Former Artist in Residence, Scott Ponemone began his current watercolor project, the “2 by 2” series, in 2017 as a way to focus on human interactions. Each painting presents the unique dynamic between two persons at the moment when Ponemone (the artist and a stranger) greets them and asks them to be models for his art. The subjects could be couples, friends, relatives or co-workers — anything that establishes a dynamic between the pair.

The dancers in Piscopink’s stunning photographs inhabit an ethereal underwater dream world, offering both an escape from the day to day, and a deep connection to nature, the human form, imagination, and profound spiritual forces.

Florida Prize finalist Robert Aiosa is a sculptor whose primary practice is wood-working, with the attention to detail and craftsmanship you’d expect from a woodworker. As an artist, however, he turns his focus on the built environment, to understand how buildings and neighborhoods are planned and transition over time. Since moving to Florida, his sculptures and installations add tropical flora into the mix, leading to conversations about the conflicts between built and natural landscapes.

Orisha: The Lost Saints is a photo series exploring the disappearing Santeria religion from the Florida Keys through large format portraits of local practitioners recast as the saints they worship. Large scale images shed a light on this fading tradition.

Self-taught artist Siegert utilizes her background in art therapy and social work to mine traditional figure and portraiture for glimmers of emotional depth and intimacy. Her acrylic and charcoal works capture the inner voice of her female subjects.

Photographer and media artist Jeane LaRance was a beloved member of the Key West community until her passing last November. Her generous and adventurous spirit lives forever in her photos. The Studios is pleased to present this breadth of images in her memory–of her beloved Haiti, her adopted hometown of Key West and of Indigenous populations in the American West–captured and rendered with LaRance’s devoted attention. Sales benefit The Studios’ scholarship program.

Caldwell’s mixed media paintings capture the exuberance of an island bursting with color: the endless shades of foliage, the magnificent variety of flowers, the aqua-teal-turquoise water, and the billowing sunsets shifting from peach-pink to the blue-purple-indigo of nightfall.

Necklace designer Maxine Makover and photographer Michael Philip explore and amplify the many stories jewelry tells. Makover taps into this potential with her creative wearable art, while Philip’s classical contemporary photographic element captures the life themes—joy, loss, sensuality—portrayed by the wearer.

In advance of the popular annual auction, The Studios presents a preview of the works that will be available for bidding on February 17. With almost a quarter century of “artists helping artists” behind them, The Studios is proud to host the annual Anne McKee auction, where aficionados bid on contemporary and classic works to raise proceeds which help fund the vital grant program for Keys artists.

One of Cuba’s leading figures since bursting onto the scene as a young sculptor in the early 1990s, Esterio Segura is an artist and community organizer of volcanic talent and seismic impact, known for his sharp critiques of Cuban politics and society. Among many international commissions is his installation at Tampa International Airport of a flotilla of cherry red airplanes, with hearts for fuselages, symbolizing the Cuban diaspora that began with the Peter Pan children airlifted to the US in the early 1960s.

Over the course of the past year, while back at home in Pennsylvania, images of crystalline waters and twisted mangroves have stubbornly pushed through former Artist in Residence Cynthia Back’s work. Now, Cynthia Back returns to Key West with a series of reduction woodcuts and collages based on the plants and homes she discovered during her month on the island.

Dave Dunn is known for his ability to turn anything that lands at his feet or fingertips— bike chains, tools, bolts, steel plates—into primordial creatures. His latest series has him repurposing hard metal castoffs into imaginative representations of the beings and beasts who rule the ocean depths.

Christine Fifer’s paintings and sculptures revolve around books – their history & their contents – all woven together with puns, puzzles, and didactic intent to both amuse and encourage conversation. Still life paintings of precariously stacked first editions are simultaneously realistic and surreal, prompting extended investigation. Leaping from the canvas, Fifer’s sculptures utilize actual books suffering from wear or neglect that have been repurposed to create playful and thoughtful sculptures in search of their own Renaissance.

Binard’s portraits combine painting with ceramic and mixed media to comment on the tension between one’s identity in the eyes of others, and the one we choose ourselves. Intensely personal, the pieces touch on Binard’s racial and cultural history.

If being mostly housebound over the last year has taught us anything, it’s been new ways of connecting. We’ve explored the world virtually, scheduled screen chats with loved ones, and opened our eyes to old injustices and hidden treasures that were around us all along. For our winter members’ exhibition, we invite artwork about wherever you are – whether it’s the view from your window, or from your mind’s eye.

With works ranging from pop-inflected paintings to postmodern ceramics, the five artists here all straddle the threshold of abstraction. They also share a common history, each connected to Bennington College in the 60’s and 70’s, and in various ways to the national art scene, and to Islamorada where the art luminaries Jules Olitski (Lauren Olitski’s father) and Larry Poons (De Luccia’s husband) lived for many years.

Culled from her ongoing Gym Series, Albritton’s colorful, awkward, and very funny paintings ultimately offer a profound commentary on the lengths people will go to in search of the perfect body. Also exhibited for the first time are pieces from her Rock Solid Bodies collection of sterling silver and stone inlay pieces, a play on the absurdity of having a rock solid gym-forged body by crafting bodies out of rocks.

The Monroe Association for ReMARCable Citizens is a non-profit agency serving differently-abled adults. Over the past several months, MARC clients have had to take extra safety precautions and self-isolate to protect their health. During that difficult time, many have found art-making to be a perfect outlet. This collection of paintings by MARC clients shows the highs, lows and in-between felt by this community during a most unusual time.

Caldwell’s mixed media paintings capture the exuberance of an island bursting with color: the endless shades of foliage, the magnificent variety of flowers, the aqua-teal-turquoise water, and the billowing sunsets shifting from peach-pink to the blue-purple-indigo of nightfall.

With works ranging from pop-inflected paintings to postmodern ceramics, these five artists all straddle the threshold of abstraction. They also share a common history, with a connection to Bennington College in the 60’s and 70’s, and currently with the national art scene. They ultimately become friends in Islamorada, where the art luminaries Jules Olitski (Lauren Olitski’s father) and Larry Poons (Paula De Luccia’s husband) lived for many years.

Binard’s portraits combine painting with ceramic and mixed media to comment on the tension between one’s identity in the eyes of others, and the one we choose ourselves. Intensely personal, the pieces touch on Binard’s racial and cultural history.

The dancers in Piscopink’s stunning photographs inhabit an ethereal underwater dream world, offering both an escape from the day to day, and a deep connection to nature, the human form, imagination, and profound spiritual forces.

Katlin Spain pieces shapes of color together into large scale oil paintings. Bright flowers overflow from fenced yards, while palms and poincianas overlap each other, covering the view above with shades of green and vermillion.

We’ll be rescheduling our April exhibitions for a later date, but in the meantime we’re excited to partner with the exhibiting artists and share a teaser of their work! On Thursday April 2, tune in to our Facebook page from 6-7pm for a First Thursday online event.

Approximately 100 Key Deer were hurt or killed by cars last year, and are further threatened by loss of habitat, hurricanes, Screwworm disease, and weakening of the Endangered Species Act. Watson has taken their plight to heart, with a series of work made from reclaimed materials depicting the Keys’ native deer and wildscapes.

With his distinctive paintings of old Key West scenes, folk artist Mario Sanchez passed down a tradition that lives on today. Featuring work by Wayne Garcia, Andy Thurber, and others.

David Genest’s recent monotonal works are group portraits – rendered in acrylic, ink, charcoal and photo transfer – depicting human moments in the domestic lives of contemporary American LGBT families.

A trio of internationally recognized artists – and former Studios’ Artists in Residence – reflect on the delicate balance of flora, fauna and humanity that share the space where ocean meets land. Mohallem’s yarn drawings of mangrove trees are obsessive metaphors for nature’s connectedness; Hayeur’s large format photos offer split screen images of life over and under water; and Skandali invents maps of underwater spaces and repurposes found beach elements, forming installations of unsettled and endangered beauty.

As a daily practice, Lynne Bentley-Kemp captures the water and sky surrounding her home each morning. Here she presents a carefully curated selection of the thousands of images she’s collected as a photographic installation that forms its own atmosphere.

Pederson’s masterful watercolor and mixed media (oil stick and cold wax) portraits depict people who have impacted her path—either for a moment or a lifetime, and from all walks of life.

The Studios is proud to host the annual Anne McKee Auction now celebrating its 25th year. Join aficionados for one of the most popular art events of the year. Proceeds fund the vital grant program exclusively benefitting Keys artists.

Miami based artist Onajide Shabaka explores ethnobotany, geology and archaeology as they relate to human history, society and culture. Through a combination of abstract, calligraphic works on paper, documentary photographs, sculpture and found objects, Alosúgbe traces Shabaka’s own family history along with the migrations of people and plants from the rice plantations of the Atlantic colonial slave era to 20th century Florida.

From drab backrooms to glittering, mirrored stages, Nadeau’s exquisite watercolor paintings document the strip bars and “gentleman’s” clubs in which she worked for decades. With an insider’s eye, she unpacks the power structures, interpersonal dynamics and financial underpinnings of this little understood world.

A new focus, a new body of work, and a new name. New York artist Josefiná Cavaliná presents still life oil paintings featuring ceramics, fruits and vegetables.

An island mainstay and one of the driving forces behind the dearly missed Sculpture Key West exhibitions, Jim Racchi studied classical stone carving in Florence before settling in the Keys. His welded creations echo that training in their strong lines and impulsive flow. Racchi’s latest work is a series of polychrome welded steel sculptures that illustrate the flow of an eddy—a circular current defined by its movement.

A simple line can speak volumes, but this year, it’s the wild, unknown space outside the lines we’re eager to explore. As we burst through the ceiling onto our rooftop terrace, our thoughts can’t help but turn to new possibilities and limitless horizons. For the members’ show, we invite artists to step outside the lines – experiment with a new color palette or medium, create a canvas out of something unconventional, deliver a fresh take on a familiar form – and find inspiration in the unexpected.

Osmeivy Ortega and Lisandra Ramirez came of age in the 2000’s when artists in Cuba were leading a resurgence of entrepreneurial activity and engagement with the outside world. In prints that have been exhibited in the US, Mexico and Spain, Ortega’s imagery is dominated by his connection to animals and the natural world. Ramirez is a sculptor and mixed media artist whose sly social commentary draws on design from Japanese anime to Spanish baroque.

The winged ladies, shadowy forests and moonlit seas of self-taught Cuban artist Silvia Rivero’s paintings and altarpieces evoke a deep sense of history and recall the magic realism of Marc Chagall.

Island poet Flower Conroy delves deep into themes of love, loss, spirituality, religion, mortality and extinction. Lately, she’s turned her eye toward the visual, and taken inspiration from Cesar A. Cruz’s idea that “art should comfort the disturbed and disturb the comfortable.” In her newest endeavor, Insects & Angels, Conroy creates art assemblages using plastic toothpicks, broken jewelry, rubber toys, bones and Christmas lights—and of course, language, to convey weighty ideas with humor and camp.

Jack McDonald uses spray paint, stencil stylings, and acrylic brush work to create off-the-wall immersive paintings. With graffiti-inspired concepts, the imagery consists of colorful backgrounds, humorous characters, and strange overlaying text. This exhibition is a culmination of 12 years of creative hard work. The WonderDog crew joins in the fun, utilizing the open space in the gallery as a Fantasy Fest workshop, where glitter, tulle feathers, glue, you name it are transformed into costumes and props.


On view to the public is a restoration project of a large-scale wooden sculpture by the beloved community member, Jon “Tosh” McIntosh. Working on a mostly volunteer basis, local sculptor Craig Gray will restore the palm-tree pencil sculpture, and plans to bring it back to its original glory over the next few months. The Studios of Key West is pleased to host the first stage of the sculpture’s restoration this summer, allowing the public an opportunity to see a part of the process.

In mid-June, a group of watercolor enthusiasts met each night at the beach, just before sunset, with paints, brushes and open imaginations. A selection of student watercolors will be shown alongside one of instructor Susan Sugar’s own in the Sanger Gallery.

Delgado works with the idea of experience – mining visual images for their emotional and spiritual content. Never having a preconceived image in mind, he seeks to portray things that are not obvious in reality, focusing instead on the composition and the balance of the work. This amalgamation of uncertainty and confidence brings his work to life in surprising ways.

Alaina Plowdrey explores ideas of physicality, drive and determination in her portraits of active duty service members. Linking her paintings to the ideas of philosopher and poet Lucretuis, Plowdrey delves into the psyche of the soldier.

To create her latest works, a series of digital images on metal, LaRance spent countless hours transferring, burnishing, sanding and varnishing.

The rules of the show are simple – nothing more than 10” in any direction – but the possibilities are endless. Since 2005, Lemonade Stand’s annual Small Works Show has become one of the most anticipated exhibitions on the island. Last year, a record number of submissions, from forty-four states and sixteen countries resulted, in nearly two hundred selected works on view. 

Stories are at the heart of Zlamany’s project, which explores the positive impact of portraiture. This multimedia exhibition features community portraits she created, and narratives she collected, during her residency.

10,000 Memories Deep consists of mixed media images that, like dreams, are fragmented yet connected, familiar yet uncertain. In Esposito’s work, past meets present, form and color traverse time, and personal narratives prevail.

A true artist of the Keys, Kerry Hoeppner is known for his ability to turn palm fronds, coconuts and other natural bits into whimsical sculptural creations.

The Tom Majors Wood Art Invitational is a month-long, island-wide celebration of the creative potential of wood, and by extension, a statement of faith that the intersection of humankind and nature needn’t be disastrous, but can result in objects and experiences filled with beauty and meaning. The Studios of Key West, in addition to serving as the hub for the invitational, will host With the Grain, an exhibition of contemporary wood artists from across the country.

People have been living on boats off Key West longer than there has been a town called Key West – or even Cayo Hueso. On The Hook is a photo a photo narrative project focussing on this community — a mix of old timers, new comers, and sailors who are here to earn enough money to make it to the next deepwater port — the people who live on the edge of the edge.

After a decade away Emma Starr reconnects with our island through her analogue photographs, seeking peace and beauty within the intimate landscape. Her images explore the native flora, surrounding waters and emotive sky that have, again, become her second homeland. Starr’s deconstructed polaroids are released from their dormant form and transformed into personal narratives.

Salvadoran artist Carlo Mejía serves as a conduit to the ancient Mayans, whose rooftop observatories were the wonders of the pre-Colombian world. His porcelain vases and colorful paintings are steeped in myth, with bold patterns and stylized faces that seem to gaze through time. Sales from the exhibition benefit the construction of “Hugh’s View,” The Studios’ rooftop terrace due to open late 2019.

Blind Spots is a three-part exhibit developed by Key West resident Erika Biddle to encourage action against human trafficking and child exploitation. Featuring powerful images by Robin Romano, an American documentary filmmaker, producer, photojournalist, and human rights activist + installations by Key West artists Cricket Desmarais and Gretchen Mills.

The history of Key West’s charming cottages, historic homes, and island architecture is examined and reimagined in this exhibition. Ruley’s revisionist approach to painting our historic jewels blends the before and after with color and whimsy.

With almost a quarter century of “artists helping artists” behind them, The Studios is proud to host the annual Anne McKee auction, where aficionados gather for one of the most popular art events of the year. Proceeds help fund the vital grant program for Keys artists.

Construction artist and painter Marks presents a breadth of work that synthesizes past and present. The collection of all new work highlights the emotional content of memory while exhibiting a consciousness of current societal issues.

Every April since 2011, the O, Miami Poetry Festival has embraced the goal of each and every person in Greater Miami encountering a poem during the month of April. How to take the words… is O’ Miami’s first-ever public retrospective, documenting the range and depth of their accomplishment with objects, photos, video and audio.

Bristol began her career as a portrait painter before adding clay to her repertoire. These days, she thrives in the dichotomy of the two mediums, imparting elements of West African and Caribbean design.

Presenting portraits in oil of writers when they were young, before they were known for their work, Dillard hopes to show that they were just ordinary people. “My hope is that future young writers will not despair that they look ordinary. Almost everyone does. That’s what ordinary means. Appearance has nothing to do with genius or talent or originality or anything else important. Appearance is misinformation.”

Photographer Larry Blackburn has created a body of collaborative works with the help of our local arts community. Artists such as Rick Worth and Pam Hobbs have layered their signature styles onto Blackburn’s photographs, creating dual visions of Key West scenes.

As we prepare for our final push to burst through the roof – and build our long-awaited roof terrace here at The Studios – we find ourselves looking upward quite a bit lately. Whether it’s the endless blue of an ocean-colored tropical sky, the stars overhead as you bicycle home at night, or a spontaneous rainbow after a mid-afternoon shower, we invite artists to consider the simple act of looking up as metaphor for a future filled with creative possibility.

How are we grappling with climate change on individual and collective levels in a place we are actively still creating?  Portable Memories in Rising Seas is an ongoing participatory project about sea level rise that connects lived experience with memory and climate change.

When we meet someone, we create somebody that doesn’t really exist. As we get to know them, our fantasy is challenged and inevitably, that image disappears. Do we keep our creation alive or replace it with reality? I Don’t Want to Lose Her explores this ever-changing perspective.

Sculptor Tom Jorris cast 14 plaster Conch Nutcrackers from the original mold of the nutcracker used in the production Nutcracker Key West. These nutcrackers inspired local artists and artisans who have embellished, painted, and re-imagined them to create one-of-a-kind works of art.

Part command center, part makers’ lounge, part exhibition space, the gallery is transformed into one of the creative hubs of this year’s Fantasy Fest as a fresh, new artistic team takes the reins. On the walls, a collection of posters, video and rare photographs from the 38 year history of Key West’s gonzo signature event. Also Christine Fifer and Co constructing over-the-top costume pieces for their Candy Land Themed Parade Float. 

Thomas Filipkowski revisits his popular 2013 project, Heads Up Key West in which he photographed 600 faces from the community. Then and Now illuminates the changes caused by  time and circumstance, providing a clear-eyed look at ordinary people coping with the reality of what it means to live in paradise.

Marge Holtz describes herself as a maker, intrigued by a spectrum of media. Holtz draws inspiration from the design process and the tactile sensation of fabric, creating art quilts that serve as love letters to color.

Sunbathers of all shapes and sizes laze in the sun or play in the ocean in Paige’s “Beach Day” series, marking a departure from her previous abstract paintings. Bright, lively and charming, the work is quintessentially tropical but never kitschy.

With poems and illustrations derived from her inner child, “Sitting in the Shade” is Divoll’s ode to her adolescence in key West spent hiding from the sun but basking in the island’s magic.

Supported by Anne McKee Artist Fund

The perennial winner of “Best Artist” awards, Rick Worth is among the defining Key West artists of his generation, and likely the most productive. From his “shingle paintings”, which frame snippets of old Town architecture on fragments of metal roofs, to the dozens of murals bearing the signature all across the island, Worth is a fountain of creativity. For this not-to-be missed event, Worth fills the gallery with recent work and installation-size paintings.

Garcia carries on the tradition of his teacher and mentor Mario Sanchez – colorful, shallow relief sculptures etched in wood – depicting his childhood in Key West.

Lasswell’s ceramic torsos and Mueller’s semi-abstract paintings and mixed media sculptures serve as a dual meditation on spirituality, sensuality and the feminine. Mueller’s vibrant colors feels like they’re drawn from natural pigments, and her surfaces impacted by elemental forces: water, air, heat and gravity. Lasswell’s sculptures reveal a dancer’s awareness of her body in all of its earthy physicality.

Victoria’s work deals loosely in the language of landscape in order to reveal a more private emotional space, at times pushing entirely away from recognizable landmarks into the world of pure form and color. The pieces in this series are built up from many obscured layers to create a sensual terrain, enriched by a complex history.

Former Artist in Residence, Esy Casey, showcases recent video work highlighting her time spent in Key West.

Eric Anfinson’s new exhibition celebrates a decade since his first TSKW show at The Historic Armory. Without Within showcases Anfinson’s new body of work alongside a retrospective of his paintings spanning the last 17 years. 

These four artists came together in 2012 through a shared interest in abstract art, and have enjoyed a collaborative relationship critiquing each other’s work. They have found that their common interest in abstract expressive painting influences their individual work, whether it be in portraiture, still life, landscape, or collage. This show of recent work reveals a diversity of approaches as each artist pursues the adventure of making art.

A former cartoonist, occasional parade organizer and ongoing designer of hats and accessories, Bradford’s ink and watercolor sketches capture the essence — and absurdity — of our island home.

This curated exhibit of work from FKCC’s Mud-Pi Ceramic Club coincides with their annual benefit on Sunday, March 11.

From the 1950s to the 80s, a group of African American painters known collectively as the Highwaymen captured the look and feel of “Old Florida” with saturated colors and unapologetic nostalgia. Drawn from the collection of Roger Lightle, some of the finest examples of their work is on view.

Inked with equal measures of confidence and whimsy, Disrud’s paintings and illustrations puzzle together bright shapes like stained glass, yielding images that might be fairy tales, or just scenes of every day wonder.

With a set of encaustic paintings and photo-transfers that feel like day dreams, the artist made famous by her “Faces of Surfing” series steps away from the large – scale portraits for which she’s known. 

Cuban sculptor and printmaker Abel Barroso is known for constructing absurdist “technology” out of wood as a wry commentary on life on both sides of the US Embargo. Timed with the Key West Literary Seminar’s “Writers of the Caribbean,” Barroso’s work is collected by MoMA and other major museums and speaks with humor and heart to geopolitical concerns.

A blue-eyed doll’s head wears a wig of tassel. A yard-sale dogtag is offset by a snippet of black ribbon and a rusty fishhook. White’s assemblage sculptures and shadow boxes are elegant studies in composition, aching with memory and loss.

A former editor of the Miami Herald’s Sunday magazine, Silverstein trains her photographic eye on Key West’s slightly run-down charm in a series of images for her accordion-book collaboration, “Look at You, Key West,” with writer Madeleine Blais.

Mark Hedden and Nancy Klingener will create a multimedia work about Hurricane Irma – starting with the experience of riding the storm out in The Studios itself, and moving on to the immediate aftermath and its effects on those who stayed in Key West and the Lower Keys.

Irma was a reminder that the cost of our delicate string of islands is the knowledge that nature comes along once in a while to wipe the slate clean. Still, signs of our resilience abound: an orchid blooming days after the storm; or neighbors helping each other clean up. Creativity often works the same way; it returns with new focus after a test. For our first post-Irma Members show we invite you to reflect on the things that bend but don’t break, the things that last, and the things that matter.

Artist and art lovers join forces to support the Florida Keys SPCA, with this annual silent auction of pet-shaped paintings.

The Lemonade Stand Gallery’s Annual Small Works Show started in 2005 and since then has exhibited artists from around the globe. The only requirement is that the finished work is under 10 inches in any direction including the frame. All media is considered as long it is original – this includes photography. A selected jury determines which pieces get chosen for this year’s exhibit. Artists have the opportunity to enter up to three pieces.

Sponsored by Strunk Ave Hardware

Illustrations and narrative from the newly released children’s book, Grandpa, Grandpa, What Will I See? telling the story of a grandfather and his granddaughter, imparting wisdom for the generations with humor, history and hope.

Fantasy Fest sets up a pop up production shop in the heart of Key West! Also featuring a collection of poster art and rare photographs documenting the Festival’s 38 year history.

Explore the Fantasy Fest’s exciting history through festival posters, collected photos, plus video projections and interviews with creators and producers throughout the years.

Taking over Key West every October with a riot of costumes, extravagant floats, and bacchanalian energy, Fantasy Fest is one of the most photogenic – and photographed – festivals in the nation. This select group of mostly local photographers find angles you’ve never seen.

Thanks to a groundbreaking cultural exchange, One Race/The Human Race, a lively dialogue between the artists and Museo Nacional de Bellas Artes, Cuba in Havana and Key West began three years ago. Since then, Key West has hosted the work of many of Cuba’s finest artists and a second exhibit of Tennessee Williams was hosted by MNBA.

Avis Collins Robinson’s new paintings and quilts portray the richness of African American life and the deep, layered meanings of a simple word: soul. Her portraits are more than beautifully rendered likenesses; they invite the viewer to look deep and experience our common humanity. Her quilts, too, are imbued not just with striking color and form but with history and emotion. They tell stories of freedom and funk, of spirit and solidarity.

Writer, photographer and Studio Artist Mark Hedden has been looking at Key West in a new light – the flip side of the intense sun and sultry colors for which we’re known. In his first solo exhibition at The Studios new home, he presents nighttime photographs of Key West and beyond.

“RePurposed Kids” is a series of vintage doll heads and Singer sewing machine drawers put together as little entities that could be described as dark, fun, disturbing, psychological, and mysterious. I like using vintage objects in my work because they are rugged and have withstood the test of time. My art is a metaphorical representation of my life experience. This series was made in part with the very generous contribution of the Ann McKee Artist fund.

A forty-year quilter and fabric arts innovator – and regular Studios instructor – Margo Ellis presents her latest textile works. Ellis draws inspiration from nature, photography, and the materials themselves, allowing dye, fabric and thread to spin into ornate yet whimsical creations.

Mabel Poblet and Lisandra Ramirez are rising stars of a new generation of Cuban artists, friends from the famed Institute of Art who recently reunited for an exhibition at the Art Museum of the Americas in Washington, DC. They’re joined here by pioneers of the previous generation, The-Merger, whose gleaming sculptures and playful collaborations set the tone for much of Cuba’s white hot art scene.

Angular steel and open horizons complement each other in surprising ways in this pairing of well-regarded Key West artists. Wynn utilizes welding, torch-cutting and grinding to create her signature works. For her, the quest to acquire scrap metal and the process of learning new machine techniques are driving forces to create. Sugar captures Key West’s tumultuous summer skies, painting on site in watercolor at dawn and dusk. Later she transforms her collection of delicate watercolors into large oils in her studio.

John Martini lives and works in Key West, Florida and Veuxhaulles-Sur-Aube, France. His sculptures are shown internationally in galleries and museums including Lucky Street Gallery in Key West, Sandler Hudson Gallery in Atlanta, GA, the Shidoni Annual in New Mexico, Galerie Antoine Laurentin in Paris, France and Galleria Santamarta in Milan, Italy. His works are extensively represented in private and public collections including the large installation, “Head2Head,” at the Grounds for Sculpture in Hamilton, New Jersey.

Pam Hobbs or Maggie Ruley are quintessential Key West artists: Hobbs with bold colors, black outlines, and a woozy perspective; and Ruley with soft seascapes that make you feel like a green flash could appear any moment. Seen together, the good friends capture just about everything we love about this place.

Key West watercolor artist Sean Callahan and 4-time Emmy Award winning writer Garin Wolf join forces for a unique assemblage of images and words. Fish Outta Water is a Southernmost tale of a haunted woman cast adrift by a tortured past, a decades-old story of deception and murder unraveled character by character at a most unconventional cocktail party. Callahan’s surreal portraits capture the story’s characters, while Wolf’s written excerpts provide clues to the mystery.

Twenty years ago, porcelain artist Cathy Rose left teaching to pursue her art full time. Thousands of clay figures later, she has built an impressive and sought-after body of work, manipulating her delicate material into faces and bodies that are adorned with found material and imbued with uncanny personality.

Since its inception 35 years ago, writers and lovers of language from around the world have flocked to the Key West Literary Seminar like the swallows of Capistrano. In a series of elegant black and white portraits, photographer Curt Richter has captured this fleeting yet persistent community. Famous writers are to be seen, yes – Margaret Atwood, William Gibson, Calvin Trillin, the list goes on – but also the volunteers, attendees and contract workers who play their role as well.

Since 1994, The Anne McKee Artists Fund has been the only grant program of its kind for Keys artists. Not only has it had an immeasurable impact on an entire generation, the artists who’ve benefited – and who are assembled for this retrospective – is a who’s who of creative people who’ve shaped our community.

Sponsored by Royal Furniture

As The Studios celebrates its TENTH birthday, we invite our artist members to cast their minds back to when they were ten themselves. Where were you, how did it feel, what did the world look like through the fresh eyes of a child? As always, the theme is optional, a springboard for your imagination. Join us for cake at the opening reception!

With bright colors that wait for nobody, and the wild freedom of childhood drawings, Lucy Stevens’ latest series captures the jumbles of bodies congregating at one of her favorite places: the bus stop. People of all shapes, colors and sizes find themselves equal there, randomly assembled and all waiting for the same thing – to go somewhere. Stevens is a former Artist in Residence who exhibits in New York, France and Key West.

In time for the Key West Film Festival a private LA collector has lent these vintage first run Hollywood posters — from 1930s Busby Berkley films all the way to Easy Rider. The vivid colors and stunning graphics are as iconic as the films themselves.

Classically trained as a figurative painter, Abiy T. Frew pushes the limits of representation and paint to maximize their expressive potential. Surfaces are built up and scraped down; pigment is applied in gentle washes or with aggressive strokes.

In the context of a global refugee crisis, Frew’s latest series, “IN/VISIBLE” starts with the notion of chiaroscuro (“light and shadow”) and explores the personal and political dimensions of displacement, absence and belonging.

The colors, the creativity, the costumes! Fantasy Fest ignites our island’s best ideas and inspirations and brings them to life. What you don’t often see are the countless hours of behind-the-scenes creative work it takes to make the magic. This month, we’re opening a window into the process and transforming our gallery into an incubator for creative expression. New Orleans parade producer Katrina Brees oversees the fun, offering tips, tricks and design guidance along the way.

Drawing on his curiosities and inspirations, Benjamin Entner creates larger than life inflatable “still lifes and portraits”. The works bridge the gap between 2D and 3D and have a sarcastic edge.

In Plowdrey’s elegant, erotically charged paintings, the interplay between land and sea becomes a dance of procreation, with the female figure standing in as Venus. The installation is layered with video of Keys residents that speaks to their connection to the landscape.

Famous for its drag shows, burlesque, festivals, and live theater tradition, Key West offers the perfect environment for a photographic exploration of identity and make believe. With the notion of transformation in mind Andrew Printer takes his camera backstage and into public spaces in search of the intangible.

Aleister Eaves, a local artist, explores trauma and healing through multichannel video production in the Project Space at The Studios.

On his third visit to Key West, Tamayo presents a body of work created just for the occasion, including a collaboration with Miami-Cuban artist Nestor Arena.

One of the world’s great political cartoonist, Kal captures the news and newsmakers of recent history with his satirical pen. The original drawings are a must-see for news junkies, history buffs, art lovers and anyone who enjoys a good chuckle.

Local artist and critical thinker Roberta Marks has become a popular fixture at The Studios of Key West. Her Abstract Painting Seminar students have been engaged in new creative learning at the newly renovated home of The Studios of Key West, 533 Eaton Street, for a ten week seminar.
The month long show includes paintings and mixed-media by 16 different students. Some have spent multiple seasons under Roberta’s eye, while others, are debuting their work after their first formal seminar with the instructor.

Three artist consider how we imprint ourselves on the landscape with the weight of culture, economy, and memory. Presented in Partnership with the Art Students League of NYC as part of Currents & Confluences: Symposium of Arts & Ideas.

Imbued with spontaneity, play, and wonder, each one offers a story to be told, and discoveries to be uncovered.

Lou Stovall has been pioneering techniques in silkscreen for almost 50 years. His own works thrum with color and energy like fields of poppies, and his legendary print workshop in Washington, D.C. has been a haven for artists from Jacob Lawrence to Alexander Calder. Stovall’s recent body of work is built of layered and torn prints, shown with a few of his favorite collaborative works with other artists.

Combining black and white photography, video and sound, Philip captures his subjects and explores how aging in place – and specifically aging in Key West – becomes a celebration of style, and the joy of living comfortably in one’s own skin.

On Thursday, January 7 from 6-8pm, The Studios of Key West kicks off a new, art-filled year with open artist studios and a reception for two new exhibitions — “16 Tons” by John Martini and “92 in the Shade” by Garth Holtkamp.

“It’s up to individuals to choose how they decorate themselves.” These necklaces drape the neck with color and light formed from rare minerals and metals. The materials are selected and cut to Konrath’s designs and then carefully assembled with a discipline of drape, tension, pattern and aesthetic consideration.

Ask what “classic” Key West is, and you’ll get a hundred answers. It might be Hemingway pulling in trophy fish, powder-fueled disco nights at the Copa, or the legend of Bum Farto

AIR Adam Maclay’s new collection transforms beauty and perspective and asks us to take a second look at how we see ourselves and the world.

In July 2014 at Havana’s Plaza Vieja, the general public — Cuban nationals only — were invited to a brief series of portraits in open-air studios with two very disparate photographers: Cuban Yanela Piñeiro and American Jeffrey Cardenas. The resulting photographic narrative — 100 black-and-white images — speaks to how these photographers look at their subjects, but also at how their subjects look back.

The Studio Artists turn their spaces inside out for the month of September, displaying their latest pieces in the XOJ Gallery. Each artist will share works that they have created over the last several months in their new home.

Quilts for Kids Nepal is a microfinance project, based in Kathmandu, Nepal. It’s mission is to provide work for economically-challenged women and to finance education for underprivileged children.

Founded in 2006, the project operates in an encampment of Indian street beggars located in a large field in the Boudhanath neighborhood of Kathmandu.

On Monday July 13, Reynerio Tamayo presents a series of his most recent paintings on an environmental theme, taking questions and speaking about the state of art in Cuba today.

South African contemporary artist Anja Marais was born in a small town in the African Bushveld. Her childhood was spent nestled inside the cottoned, pseudo-utopia of a segregated society. Seeking to pierce the elusive truth of a land operating ‘under the rose,’ she turned towards art to shed light on the shadows of humanity and herself.

Jodell’s long-standing fascination with film negatives began when teaching pinhole photography and has since developed into a full exploration of the possibilities. For this exhibition, Jodell presents a world in reverse: luminous darks, light as shadow, foreground and background fluctuating. This shift expands our perception and explores the power, beauty, structure and interconnectedness of all things.

Key West Pottery co-owner and former AIR, Adam Russell debuts his latest body of two and three-dimensional work. Future Ancient springs from Adam’s love of history and indigenous methodology, as it is filtered through a contemporary/postmodern lens. The result is a colorful celebration of island aesthetics and an over-sized and entirely unique take on ceramics.

Year after year, Marks has proven to be not only an impressive artist, but also an inspiring and challenging instructor. Her students work diligently to create their best abstractions, while exploring the deep driving reasons behind their personal expressions. Works representing 10 weeks of dedication by her 2015 class are on view.

Miles Davis’ The Birth of the Cool is celebrated for its innovative style and inclusion of numerous notable musicians. As TSKW moves into its new home, we celebrate our own “rebirth of the cool” with an exhibition inviting members to explore ideas of reinvention and improvisation. Participating artists may interpret the concept literally or abstractly, resulting in a wide array of ideas and visuals.

Stainless, the three-man collective of Alejandro Pineiro Bello, Jose Gabriel Capaz and Roberto Fabelo Hung, create works that are provocative and significant, without sacrificing the fun. Fresh out of Havana’s renowned San Alejandro Academy of Fine Art, these young artists who embody equal parts bravado, seduction, and humor are thriving amidst the explosion of recent interest in contemporary Cuban art.