Soho Beach House in Miami has reoriented its art collection around photography in late 2025, featuring works by established figures like Isaac Julien, JR, Laurie Simmons, Marilyn Minter, and Ming Smith alongside emerging artists such as René Matić, Caroline Allison, and Walead Beshty. The rehang, overseen by chief art director Kate Bryan, spans polaroids, performance-derived imagery, collage, and cameraless prints, with a focus on artists who use photography as a tool for broader inquiry.
This shift matters because it challenges the historical undervaluation of photography within the art world, a medium that artists like Laurie Simmons and Cindy Sherman turned to after feeling excluded from painting's male-dominated sphere. By centering photography in a prominent private collection, Bryan aims to demonstrate that these artists are 'artists first and foremost' using the medium to make important inquiries into identity, culture, and society, potentially influencing how photography is perceived and collected in the future.