Lake Worth Beach-based artist Kristin Miller's public exhibition "We Become the Place" will be on display through Jan 20. Pictured is Miller's 2021 mixed-media work "Basking in Bougainvillea," created with handmade paper, Xerox transfer, charcoal, wire and ribbon. (Photo by Kristin Miller)
“Kristin Miller: We Become the Place” will be on display Dec. 8 through Jan. 20 at the Solo Gallery of the Cultural Council for Palm Beach County’s headquarters in downtown Lake Worth Beach. The exhibition is free and open to the public Tuesday through Saturday from noon to 5 p.m.
“We Become the Place” creates habitats through the layering of mixed-media materials on paper and in sculptural installations. Referencing South Florida’s flora and fauna, marine life, and horizon lines, Kristin Miller’s work creates a sense of “wall life” dancing delicately between 2D and 3D spaces to explore identity and adaptation.
Acting as nature’s gesture drawings, air plants and jellyfish are shapeshifters, while other flora and fauna create a consistent narrative. Nature morphs to its specific location, becoming the place. Through quiet observation, people adapt as well — drifting through identities, creating a symbiosis between daily life and the physical environment.
“My work is an exploration of my relationship with nature and the distinctive landscape of South Florida,” Miller says. “It’s about being inspired by it, paying homage to it and using it to create my work. Everything I do is inspired by the sea, land or sky. I like to think of nature as the beginning of my work and experimenting with different materials as the end result.”
Miller is one of six Palm Beach County-based professional artists, all women, whose work was selected through a highly competitive process for the Cultural Council’s 2023-24 Solo Gallery exhibition spots.
“Kristin Miller’s delicate and meticulous work elegantly conveys a sense of the Florida landscape and the environment that we experience here,” says Jessica Ransom, the Cultural Council’s director of artist services and the curator of the exhibition. “This exhibition will be a calm space that encourages a visitor to stop, breathe and absorb the imagery as if in nature.”
An artist and designer based in Lake Worth Beach, Miller is the department chair of fine arts and graphic design at Palm Beach State College, where she has taught for 16 years. She holds a bachelor’s degree in studio art from Florida State University and a master’s in visual studies from the Visual Studies Workshop.
Miller’s work has been seen in the Cultural Council’s 2023 and 2021 “Biennial” exhibitions, as well as in “Waves” at Arts Warehouse in Delray Beach, “Art on BRiC Walls: A Boca Raton Museum of Art Juried Exhibition” in Boca Raton, the international art fair ArtPalmBeach and numerous Palm Beach State College faculty shows.
Visit www.palmbeachculture.com/miller for more information or to register for the opening reception on Thursday, Dec. 7, from 5 to 7 p.m. To see more of Miller’s work, visit www.kristinmiller.art.
