URBAN BEACH WEEK 2012

UnWelcome to Miami by Rochelle Oliver

It was the sort of thing nightmares are made of. Hordes of men and women armed with guns walking the streets. Their accents, punctuated with sounds that indicate they’re from the same tribe. These foreigners lurked around every corner. They came by air, by foot and by car. I was a hostage in my own backyard. On Memorial Day, May 28, 2012, the police, that is, were everywhere.

Nearly $2 million was spent to deter and detain party-goers during Urban Beach Week – a four-day affair. The money was used to employ 600 officers, an air chopper, high-tech surveillance observation towers, a DUI checkpoint and a one-way traffic loop. I decided to go to South Beach, armed with only my Canon G10, to find out for myself: Are black people really this dangerous?

This series of images counters the racist comments being perpetrated by the media, the police and the noisemakers (not to be confused with the masses).

Bold and Beautiful

I saw people of all shades and sizes commingling and laughing. I struck up a conversation with a detective from Hialeah who said, ‘there are people wearing outfits they have no right to be wearing.’ She snickered as she said this. I replied with a smile and told her, ‘yeah, but that happens year around. You know, in the wintertime all the beached whales are on the shore trying to get a tan.’ She turned away from me.

I didn’t understand why the sight of black barely naked bodies was so disturbing. After all, Miami Beach is topless-city central. Arguably, I’ve seen other women’s titties more often than I have seen my own.  

Purpose: I took photos that explored the nakedness of people with white skin and black skin. I tried to capture Miami Beach for what it is: A place where people – clothed, unclothed, fat, tall, tucked or taped – can enjoy being kissed by the sun.

Lighting: The fact that the sun was high in the sky helped to further my point. It provided a sharp contrast that forced me (and hopefully people who view these pictures) to place people into a box and ask what’s the difference?

But something was amiss. In the background, palm trees and observation towers were fighting for the same space. The palm trees were losing.

Police Presence 
The ultimate cost of Beach Week 2012 cannot be calculated in dollars. Business owners said traffic was slow because it was difficult to access the shops and restaurants. I approached two men from Mississippi who attended Miami Memorial Weekend last year. They said that all the police enforcement made them feel uncomfortable.

Purpose: I tried to capture the scale and voyeur nature of the police presence. I did a 360 from the visitor’s POV – looking at the cops – and the cop’s POV, too.

Parking was prohibited along main streets. Along Ocean Drive, sidewalks were blocked off with a maze-work of barricades, which forced people to walk on the streets without access to covered walkways. This was supposedly done to stop dine-and-dash patrons. But if anyone wanted to skip out on a check, all they had to do was walk onto the street. A waiter would easily get caught up with the trappings before catching the thief.

The observation towers, however, proved to be the most obtrusive. They pieced the blue Miami skyline. They showed up in my pictures even when I tried to work around them. They will surely appear in the backdrop of the thousands that descended onto the Beach for vacation. And naturally, the images will be seen by millions on Facebook giving new meaning to the saying, “Welcome to Miami, Bitch!”