Last night, The MAM Contemporaries Young Collectors Council and The Society Miami presented an "Artist Workshop with Michael Genovese," an intimate and interactive evening exploring the creative process in one of the most gorgeous settings in South Beach.

Staged at a spectacular and sprawling 6-bedroom glass house, located on Lakeview Court, the workshop was part of a new wave of art presentations that are happening throughout South Florida in places other than galleries or museums halls.

Young collectors and art patrons are finding out innovative and practical ways to interact with artists, presenting exhibits and promoting Real Estate as well. The architectural waterfront residence selected for this workshop is on the market for $8,450,000 listed with prestigious Keller Williams South Florida.

Chicago artist Michael Genovese presented his ongoing 4-year project titled "Public Scribing," a collaborative process that began at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Chicago  in 2008 and since then has been traveling South to the University of Texas in San Antonio, and later to Miami, where it has been all over the place.

Genovese, who is represented by OHWOW Gallery enjoyed the opportunity to mix and mingle with private members of cultural institutions in a totally different context.

"This is also great for my work, because it captures a specific demographic and since the project has a social-science element, it can be in the ghetto with impoverished kids, or it can be in a wonderful place like this with an educated and cultured crowd," said Genovese.

Genovese aims to find out the differences between people from every spectrum of society across the country that interact with his "live-drawing" work.  

Last night, he also exhibited his engravings and the sculpture that was at the New Work Miami 2010 exhibit at the Miami Art Museum.

Genovese's goal is to collect, archive and exhibit the uniqueness of the American perspective in times of change. He is also using an Internet component to his project: a video with all the transcriptions and drawings that are done by other people that participate in the "Public Scribing" project.

"All those transcriptions I put them into an Internet form that are given to another set of people that link that text into Google searches, so in the video you actually see the images that are illustrating the texts that you are finding on the live-drawing plates," he added.

"Since this is a 4-year project, I'm trying to see within this time and with the amount of information I get, what kind of work am I going to make to finish it," he concluded.

The event was sponsored exquisitely by Zacapa Rum from the volcanic soils of Guatemala, promoting their liquor aged at 2,300 meters above sea level in a house above the clouds.