Jack Pierson Revisits His Miami Years at The Bass

Opening at The Bass, “Jack Pierson: The Miami Years” reflects on the artist’s transformative time in Miami Beach during the 1980s—a period that shaped his vision of beauty, longing, and impermanence. Featuring the new commission ARRAY (MIAMI), the exhibition traces how the city’s light, thrift-store treasures, and queer subcultures became enduring touchstones in Pierson’s work, merging art, memory, and the search for self across decades.

WHITEWALL: You’ve described Miami Beach as a place of both freedom and transformation. How did that first six-month stay in 1984 alter your perspective as an artist?

JACK PIERSON: I think what it did was slow down the hustle I felt I had to strive for in New York.  I’d only been in New York about nine months when I left for Miami Beach, but already I felt like  I was behind. I was 23, and already felt washed up because I was the same age as Basquiat and  Keith Haring, and they’d been “flying the Concorde” for years. So going to Miami was like a bit of a haven, like, “Okay, nobody’s expecting anything of me. I can hide out. The pace is  slower, the people are nice, there’s sunshine, and the beach.” It became clear to me: this is the life I want. Not the hustle. I still vacillate between those extremes of hustle and hibernation. 

“I still vacillate between those extremes of hustle and hibernation,”

-Jack Pierson

WW: Tell us about your new commission for The Bass, ARRAY (MIAMI)? 

JP: Well, the work moves in time from left to right. It starts in 1984 and ends around 1989.  During that time, I made several shifts in both locale and attitude. When I first arrived in ’84, I  started in a fleabag hotel and ended up in a millionaire’s penthouse, both about a block away from each other, both had the same themes for me personally – like counting pennies to buy café Cubano, but the contexts were totally different. So yeah, impermanence runs through all of it.  Everything shifts, but the core remains. 

Jack Pierson on Where Fashion Meets Art

WW: You came of age in a generation that included Nan Goldin, Felix Gonzalez-Torres,  and Mark Morrisroe. How did the queer and bohemian circles of New York and Miami shape your emotional and visual vocabulary? 

JP: In Miami, I don’t know that I had much direct contact with a queer art scene. If it existed, it felt small, and I was only peripherally involved. In New York, those figures you mentioned were important to the aesthetic. But to them, it was like, “What the hell are you doing down there?” 

WW: Your editorial and commissioned work for fashion and style magazines often blurs into your fine art practice. How do you see the dialogue between art, fashion, and celebrity—so emblematic of 1980s Miami—informing this exhibition? 

JP: If you’re doing fashion correctly, it’s art. I don’t know what’s particularly unique about  Miami in that sense, except it’s long been used for fashion shoots because of its proximity to New York, great light, etc. There’s a famous Diana Vreeland quote from the ’50s where she says something along the lines of, “Just don’t give me another palm tree!” And when I got to Miami, I was like, “Palm trees!!” I couldn’t photograph them enough, and still do. 

WW: “The Miami Years” traces a city’s enduring imprint on your life and work. Looking back, what does Miami symbolize for you now—forty years later—both personally and artistically? 

JP: It’s youth. I spent my youth there among old people, and now I’m the old person trying to tell my stories to the youth.

What to Know

Don’t Miss
ARRAY (MIAMI) — a monumental ten-by-fourteen-foot collage combining photographs, posters, poems, and ephemera that trace Pierson’s Miami years.

Why It Matters
Marks the first exhibition devoted to Miami’s lasting influence on Jack Pierson’s life and practice.

Dates
September 24, 2025 – August 16, 2026.

Venue
The Bass, Miami Beach.