There’s no drug, and no comedown, like Miami

Ass, Gas or Grass (Nobody Rides for Free)
Broken down and busted on the side of the road
Fifty Seven Chevy ain’t got no mo
Snakeskin boots and tight Daisy Dukes chrome
Mirrored sunglasses man she’s looking so
cute
Out goes the thumb now she needs a ride up pulls a wild eyed
Rebel says jump inside
Whispers the spirit of the gypsy might be your creed
But Ass Gas or Grass nobody rides for free Ass Gas or Grass Nobody Rides For Free.

I read these words on a phone thrust in my face by Angeline Urie. “This…is the perfect description of Art Basel” she declares, offering me hits of her dab pen in between showing me pictures of her various Art Basel crushes. An indefinable art world socialite of sorts, Angeline had appeared a few days prior in a puff of smoke at the Untitled Art Fair and promptly nestled us under her all-enveloping kaftan wing. I’d first met her at the Groucho Club, recognising her from a Plaster interview. Gossip and idealised anecdotes of a socialite’s existence drip out of her mouth as shining jewels that myself and Dora Denshan Bond (Plaster production assistant, vox-popping sensation and my beard for the week) gobble up like breadcrumbs. It’s fair to say that Angeline became our Miami Mummy.

It’s Saturday and I’m writing this on a sun lounger at the rooftop bar of Soho House in the shadow of a blaring speaker spilling Ibiza house sunset beats out over the terrace and down into the ocean. I’ve waited an hour for a glass of water. I paid $30 for a cocktail in a plastic cup, $40 for a burger served with no sauce and plastic cutlery. Everything is beautifully shit. Everyone is willing to endure sub-par conditions for a chance to be seen and/or see. This is the pinnacle of Miami Art Week.

Rewind to Monday. We landed late afternoon and I dragged Dora through the airport at speed with one thing in mind: the beach. “If we stick to my strict schedule, we could have the Atlantic Ocean lapping against our faces by sunset”. Alas, my salty dreams dissolved as we reached the three-hour long passport queue, a brutal introduction to Miami’s core ideology: traffic. I watched the sky turn a deep purple through the thick airport windows, deliberating whether the warning: “Don’t swim after dark… there are ocean crocodiles” held any modicum of truth. The snaking queue quickly turned into a game of ‘guess who’s here for Art Basel’, critiquing the lack of ‘experimental plane outfits’ and secretly vaping up our sleeves.

We went straight to an opening at the Faena Hotel and arrived in a jet lagged dream to big cars, bigger heels and even bigger attitude. “Put your sunglasses on and walk like you deserve to be here” I instructed Dora as I fell out of the car. It promised various exhibitions and a large beach installation, but we struggled to find any art apart from an AI confessional booth in the middle of the lobby with a queue too long to make it worthwhile. As we tried to find the beach we were confronted by Damien Hirts’s $30M, gold plated, wooly mammoth skeleton. A foreboding symbol of things to come.

We snuck into the Untitled Art Fair opening party which was average at best and full of everyone I normally try to avoid in London. We ditched and walked home through the nighttime streets of SoBe, lined with mannequins, neon lights,  gun bongs, diamonté Air Force 1s, ‘I’m gay bitch’ t-shirts and MAGA baseball caps. Our Miami inauguration was completed with fried chicken and a midnight strawberry milkshake in a chrome plated diner.

On Tuesday morning, I finally got my heart’s desire. Wearing ‘fuck off’ sunglasses and clenching my Frappe Grandé, I strutted to Ocean Drive in the blaring sun to have a morning swim in the warm December sea. After Facetiming our moms and a couple of cigarettes we got a car to the VIP opening of NADA.

The fair was housed in a former 1920s ice factory, which guests enter via a large lawn speckled with palm trees. The sun beat down on gallerists and collectors taking AirPod phone calls whilst swinging in hammocks. I wasn’t sure what to expect but the art surprised me. It wasn’t the watered down, commercialised American gimmickry I was expecting. The work, particularly the painting, was experimental and commercially challenging. A lot was engaged in a technological discourse which in England tends to get lost in a pretentious void land. My favourites included image transfers of Maria Callas with crashed racing cars and a painting of two kissing killer whales at SeaWorld. The whole experience was a cool Candy Crush gorge on contemporary painting that I hate to admit… I enjoyed. We spent most of our time chasing rich people and interviewing roosters. Or the other way around.

The remainder of the evening morphed into an intoxicated art world binge. We arrived at Slawn’s opening to a block-long queue of people outside. Floating around in a pastel pink suit that coordinated with both the paintings and the Miami sunset, Saatchi Yates’ own Edie Jones beckoned us in. The whole room smelt like a hot box. The paintings aren’t for me but I am fascinated by the mass appeal Slawn has garnered with collectors including A$AP Rocky and Skepta. A mass of memorabilia began collecting around the back wall and soon it was apparent that the people queuing were fans, clutching their own work and divine objects, religious offerings to the unplanned shrine. In exchange for each offering, Slawn would spray paint your jacket. Muscled by three security guards and flocked by fans, he circulated the room drinking a lethal concoction of Hennessy and Codeine. I didn’t think it was possible for a visual artist to reach this level of divine status. Everyone was welcome and everyone wanted to talk, which was a far cry from London’s ‘private’ views. Art was illusioned into worship.

On entering the ICA party [ICA Miami>ICA London] we met a supposed ‘famous’ artist, who introduced himself on a first name basis, making him ungoogleable. The art was good and backdropped by a wedding disco rave in the sculpture courtyard. I liked the mannequin rock band. The bar was better. The barman recognised our accent and tells us about the Muse tattoo he got in London 18 years ago. This exchange grants us unlimited free tequila; clout = currency. We tried to sneak into the Gucci party but failed phenomenally. As we swayed gently from intoxication on the street before the sun had even set, I knew we needed food if we were to make it through the night. We ordered an Uber to a Wendy’s drive-through outside the Tesla showroom on the Gucci wifi.

MAAM, THIS IS A WENDY’S. My spicy chicken burger, fries and large Ginger Lime Diet Coke was the best meal I had in Miami. Refuelled, we stumbled a couple of blocks to the Rubell Museum which is located directly adjacent to a giant, steaming, trash sorting facility. We were as steaming as the trash.

The Rubell: Kiefer. Kusama. Keith. Others I didn’t get the name of. My favourite was a tower of orgied bodies sprouting camera equipment from limbs opposing an empty pink carpeted room where a figure floats gently on a thin plate of hanging glass. I went into a Kusama Infinity Room for the first time. I learnt that the stars are holes in the mirrors when I was jumpscared by an eye peering in from the other side. For a while we follow a camera crew filming a swarm of same-surgery sugar mommies and a couple of lagging gays. Apparently a new reality show. Not the Kardashians.

For the duration of the week, the basement of the Edition Hotel was hosted by Silencio, the David Lynch-designed private members’ club in Paris. We descend into the darkness of the MOMA PS1 party and reemerge hours later, considerably more intoxicated. We plan to end at Twist, Miami’s notorious gay bar, dangerously located a mere two blocks from our Hotel (The glorious Hotel Clinton, which, for this week, is a gallerina-rammed chic shithole). It seemed everyone in the art world ends at Twist. Dora fell asleep whilst we ‘spruced’ at the hotel so I entered the wifi-less streets alone without data and eventually found Edie hanging out of the front door of Twist. I can’t remember what happened next.

I should have recognised the forthcoming intensity of the actual Art Basel fair and not gone to bed at 5 am. I had assumed it would be like Frieze London, which I have survived horrendously hungover every year. Wrong. Everything about it was imposing. Forced to enter through airport style security, I realised it was a bad day to be completely covered in metal accessories. The room was reminiscent of an Ikea-Costco love child. There were no windows. My hangover was attempting to escape my body using any hole it could find. In the distance I saw Bella Bonner-Evans of Stephen Friedman gallery. We exchanged hellos and I saw a panic set so deep in her eyes that my instinct was to roll her up, sneak her out in my bag and set her free on some grass in the sunshine. We were at the First Choice VIP opening and I was wearing an inside out Barry Manilow T-shirt and Dora was wearing a £16 fancy dress Union Jack dress from Vinted. I felt like a piece of dirt stuck to the sole of a diamond-encrusted Louis Vuitton trainer (of which we saw many).

We walked the endless corridors of booths, hunting for people to interview. Our first was a lady who’d just bought a painting. A self declared “former film director”, she began directing us, screeching “CUT” every 20 seconds to make sure her surgically-altered profile caught the glaring fluorescent lights just right whilst she dommed the gallerist she just bought from. She eventually snatched my phone out of my hands to airdrop herself the videos, so desperate to declare to the world her wealth, status and attendance at Art Basel. Cuff me but I secretly enjoyed watching the pathetic desperation of the rich. Dora’s first question to her was “have you seen anything today you want to lick?” which was not, I imagined, the coverage she was expecting. The tone was set and we continued to roam, now with our tails between our legs. We were struggling. I had never experienced that level of wealth before. These are the rich people you don’t find in public places.

Then we found Funky, or rather, Funky found us – an influencer-cum-feigned celebrity who is famous for holding the Guinness World Record for the most celebrity signatures tattooed on his body. Between flirting with Dora and peacocking his tattooed back, he announced that Leonardo DiCaprio is in the building. We spent the rest of the fair trying to find Leo, periodically pausing to massage our feet and sit on the only available seating: a sex swing. Much to our dismay the only celebrity we found was Tracey Emin. I don’t remember much of the art. In contexts such as this, the art amalgamates into an indecipherable pulsating mass of regurgitated imagery. I remember a labyrinth maze of old vinyl soul records, a painting of Martha Stewart and a tattooed bust of Jesus that looked like Justin Bieber. Art Basel tried to destroy my soul, but I survived.

The rest of the day was a blur. Our silver lining was a dinner hosted by Sadie Coles, Mendes Wood DM, Chantal Crousel, Gladstone, and Kurimanzutto (still don’t know who the last three are). Starving and parched from an hour-long Uber in standstill traffic, we arrived late. The vibe is: Balenciaga designs Mamma Mia. I saw Sadie sat just beyond the door, guarded by a stroppy Lady sporting fuck-me pumps and a pink, frayed blazer. “Sorry… your names aren’t on the list….” she spits, clutching her clipboard like it’s the only thing that affords her any lifeblood. We show her our RSVP email that “confirms our attendance” by Mendes Wood DM. She looks us up and down and through a scrunched face taunts, “You know this is a… private dinner… for… Galleries…?”. If Sadie Coles wasn’t sitting 10ft away I would have let the Jewish mother inside of me roar out at that door girlie. (We will be friends someday, Sadie, one day). In the wake of this unfortunate misunderstanding, we chain smoked rollies on the bench outside until we got asked to leave. This my friends, is Art Basel. We returned to South Beach to party.

On Thursday morning I snuck off to the 11th Street Diner to live my glorified lie of being an international journalist.

Untitled Art Fair is a neon pink pyramid on the beach surrounded by a large expanse of sand littered with Tesla Cyber Trucks. A fresh white tent where the sea pierces through windows in between booths, an ice cream cart full of mini rosé prosecco: heaven. Though more commercially minded than NADA, it retained the same sense of excitement.

Dora and I stood gossiping in the middle of the fair when we were rudely interrupted. “Excuse me, can you move so I can take a picture of this”. It’s Angeline. I promptly gnawed her ear off with my tentative plan to sleep with an A-lister. She whispers into my ear: “Troye Sivan is staying at the Setai, I saw him just this morning” Not in my top 10, but an A-lister nonetheless, so, Angeline invited us to her friend’s Art Basel adjacent book launch at the Setai Hotel later that evening in the hope that I might get to sleep with Troye Sivan. Once again my heart was destined for two things: tequila and the sea.

In the blaring midday sun we decided to get a pre-swim drink at Miami beach’s darkest hole, Mac’s Club Deuces, established in 1926 and seemingly unchanged since the 50s. Long live the American dive bar! Mac de Deuces is a functioning relic of a now lost city, housing the remnants of 20th century culture. After a couple of tequila and pineapple juices, we were lubricated enough to begin a full flash photoshoot at the back of the bar.

At the Setai, everyone was staring at everyone. The party wrapped around a Japanese style pond where aerial dances performed to house remixes of Sade. There was a huge platter of free sushi, a cigar vending machine, unlimited tequila and smoking inside was permitted. Angeline whisked us around, introducing us to a mass of collectors, dealers, property developers, the lot. In true London style, we found a place to sit, dual wielding drinks and chain rolling cigarettes. I quickly forgot about Troye.

Dora fell asleep in the Uber to the opening party at the Perez Art Museum. Concerned for her longevity, I put my sunglasses on her and made her practice walking in a straight line. I took Dora back to the Hotel and snuck back out to meet my friend Antonia at Twist. I am greeted by one of her gallery directors twerking on top of the bar. The other, hovered, chic, restless, vaping. ‘Those who shall not be named’ – as they requested to be called – whipped me, and eight others into a single Uber. We were on our way to E11EVEN, a famous strip club. In the queue, the gallery director whispered gently, into my ear, “I promise you that what’s about to happen in there is going to blow your tiny little mind. Think about everything that’s wrong about the world and then times it by a million. That’s what’s in there”. We didn’t get in, apparently because A$AP Rocky was inside. We ended up at a different club where the walls were lined with fur.

Friday’s rule was no art. I soaked up my hangover at La Sandwicherie before returning to Deuces to interview the Miami locals about art.

Later we saw Fat Boy Slim at an official Art Basel affiliated ‘rave’ around the pool of the SLS hotel: a man in a Van Gogh painting costume, carnival girls parading firework-stuffed champagne bottles, $20 shots of tequila, poppers. We tried to go to more parties that evening but after seeing Fat Boy Slim, what’s the point? The only thing left to do was go back to Twist until closing.

It’s Saturday. The Uber wait time outside of Soho House was an eye watering 50 minutes. It takes us an hour to complete the 15 minute drive back to The Clinton. I am destroyed. My ears squint through sleep to hear Dora trying to persuade me to go for Sushi. I drag open my eyes. It’s 8 pm. She’s gone. The edges of music spill through the streets of South Beach, concocting a symphony of sound that creeps up to my window, begging me to go out. 3.30 am. My eyes peel themselves open, sticky with the glue of sleep deprivation. Palm trees sway against a deep purple star filled sky, their leaves gently catching reverberations of light from neon signs along Washington Avenue. We wake up at 6 am and run to the beach to watch the sunrise.

It was quickly apparent that Miami Art Week is not about art. The art acts as a tenuous anchor for a much larger social event: a ritual gathering of the wealthy elite. In Miami, money doesn’t buy happiness, it buys mediocrity. No one seems to care about what they’re buying. The raison d’être is to waste money on mediocrity in order to prove how much you have to waste. I thought the American Dream was a sham but I was staring at it smack bang in the face, and when presented in such glory it’s almost impossible to resist. I was prepared to experience a much greater class disparity in America but in truth, spending a week amongst the mega rich in Miami only highlighted the rigidity and immovability of Britain’s class system.