Artists and Collectors Kicked off Art Week at an Intimate Dinner for the ICA Miami

This year’s Miami Art Week kicked off with a literal bang. Currently installed on the third floor of the ICA Miami is a kinetic sculpture by the conceptual master Charles Gaines, which features a granite boulder that gets dropped into (or suspended just above) a plate of glass at random intervals, surprising and delighting the art world crowd that descended upon the museum on Tuesday for the opening of a show that brings together 30 years of Gaines’s practice. When the sculpture was activated, the occasional shriek punctuated the usual hushed gallery murmurs.

Also on view: a series of haunting, surrealist self-portraits by Sasha Gordon, a site-specific installation by Tau Lewis, a suite of paintings by the Egyptian modernist Ahmed Morsi, and a photographic work by Anne Collier. In the bustling courtyard, gallerists, artists, collectors and curators discussed the works—and their plans for the busy week ahead—over Maestro Dobel margaritas and chilled Saratoga Spring Water.

After the opening, a more intimate crowd ventured across the bay to the home of ICA Miami Trustees Kris and Maky Hinson for a standing dinner presented in partnership with W Magazine and Instagram. A pavilion on the lawn of the collectors’ stately waterfront home was activated with an immersive installation inspired by Gaines’s “Numbers and Trees” series. Designed by Edward Soledad of Roses et Pivoines, the colorful array of palm fronds and neon lights made for a perfectly Instagrammable moment.

Guests at the Hinson home included ICA Miami artistic director Alex Gartenfeld; artist Sasha Gordon with her parents, Song and Gregg; Art Basel CEO Noah Horowitz; local gallerist Nina Johnson, whose just-opened Katie Stout exhibition has been generating lots of buzz; artist Cynthia Talmadge and 56 Henry’s Ellie Rines, both fresh off of installing Talmadge’s work at 56 Henry’s debut Basel booth; The Webster founder and CEO Laure Hériard Dubreuil and her husband, the artist Aaron Young; actor and musician Jeremy Pope; Jamaican musician Shenseea; David Zwirner sales directors Marlene Zwirner and Thor Shannon; Esther Kim Varet, owner of L.A.’s Various Small Fires; ZONAMACO and Arte Baja California founder Zelika Garcia; and artists Ryan Wilson (who goes by ThankYouX), Kennedy Yanko, and many more.

Under towering palm trees wrapped with twinkling Christmas lights, the crowd toasted with Dobel 50 Negronis, nibbled on salmon ceviche, risotto topped with edible flowers, and mini pizzas (complete with their own mini pizza boxes), and sampled Dobel 50 Cristalino, a premium sipping tequila at an intimate waterfront tasting bar.