La Esquinita

Locust Projects presents La Esquinita (Little Corner), premiering the first major solo show by Miami artist and musician Tara Long. In an all-encompassing installation, Long transforms Locust Projects' exterior and lobby into a quirky and surreal Sweets & Souvenirs shop filled with more than 500 tempting mini sculptures for sale. As part of Locust Projects' commitment to supporting risk-taking and commissioning experimental new art and ideas, it has turned its space over—inside and out—to emerging Miami-based artist and performer, Tara Long, and her all-encompassing creative vision. Part corner store, part surreal dream, La Esquinita transforms Locust Projects into a sugar-coated parable about power, pleasure, and decay. From the building's colorful façade to the towering, crumbling cake inside, Miami-born artist Tara Long exposes the hidden costs of sweetness—how sugar built this place, drained its swamps, shapes our bodies, our appetites, and our myths. Visitors move through three acts produced by the artist in collaboration with a community of artists, musicians, and performers: the seductive storefront of tempting confections; the collapsing "cake hall," where performance and sound unravel the fantasy; and the secret speakeasy where nature, and truth, begin to return. What starts as a bodega, evolves into a stage, leading to a confession booth, and finally, a swamp reclaiming its ground. Long's world fuses Miami's candy-colored surfaces with its buried histories, linking the exploitation of land to the conditioning of desire. La Esquinita asks: when indulgence becomes survival, what does it cost to stay sweet? Long's Locust Projects exhibition, her first major solo show, was selected from 650 open call applications for the Main Gallery by a review panel including Juan Roselione-Valadez, Director of the Rubell Museum and past exhibiting artists Rafael Domenech (2023) and Rosario Marquardt of R+R (2000). The artist wishes to thank Lucia Aquino, David Sinopoli, Tom Mickelson, Freddy Jouwayed, Brett Potter, HoxxoH Studio, and Serge Toussaint. La Esquinita is commissioned by Locust Projects and curated by Executive Director Lorie Mertes. It is made possible with support from Funding Arts Network.