Josh Aronson (born 1994, Toronto, ON, Canada) is an internationally exhibited artist and photographer whose work has received critical acclaim from leading publications including The British Journal of Photography, Dazed Magazine, i-D Magazine, Garage Magazine, Italian Vogue, Document Journal, Metal Magazine, Venice Magazine, and Design Miami’s Forum Magazine, among others. In 2021, he was honored with the Miami New Times’ Best of Miami: Best Photographer distinction.
In 2020, Aronson’s first artist book, “Tropicana” (2020), sold out in its first week. It is now accessible for viewing through prestigious collections including The Metropolitan Museum of Art’s Costume Institute Library in New York, New York and The Library of Congress in Washington, D.C. In 2021, Aronson’s debut Miami solo exhibition, “Tropicana” (2021), opened at the Design District. The show paired photo works with vintage plastics to expand on the themes explored in the publication.
Recent solo exhibitions also include “Beyond Class”, Club Gallery, Miami, Florida (2022) and “I Thought About Posting This” Congruent Space, Chicago, Illinois (2019). Aronson has participated in local, national and international group exhibitions including “Looking Along Side Another”, Studio Justine Kurland, Brooklyn, New York (2024); “Like a child”, New Art Dealers Alliance, nada.org (2022); “Viewfinder”, Lower East Coast, Miami, Florida (2021); and “Sun Pours Daylong”, Miami Design District, Miami, Florida (2020).
Aronson earned his Bachelor of Arts in Philosophy from Northwestern University in Evanston, Illinois (2016). That following year, he began working for his hero, the artist Ryan McGinley, while making portraits of artists who he met online through social media platforms such as Instagram. In 2018, Rangefinder Magazine named Aronson’s work to its annual “Portraits of the Year” list and Photo District News named him to its “Emerging Photographers” to watch list.
Aronson currently lives and works in Miami, Florida.
‘Florida Boys’ 2020-2024
Archival pigment prints 54.45 in. x 40 in. each. Editions of 3, + 2 APs
Over the course of four years, Josh Aronson’s ‘Florida Boys’ unfolded as an epic photographic journey, spanning 8,000 negatives, 150 locations, and 75 subjects across Florida’s landscapes. Each carefully constructed scene brings together young men who, in many cases, are meeting for the first time-a method that imbues the work with a raw, immediate tension as they navigate a shared performance. Through Aronson’s lens, the intimacy of these fleeting connections is highlighted in gestures that break from stereotypes of masculinity, depicting tenderness, camaraderie, and solitude.
Raised in Florida, Aronson brings an autobiographical lens to the project, reimagining his past in images that join a lineage of staged narrative photography. He draws on the surreal and evocative frameworks pioneered by Justine Kurland (his mentor), Ryan McGinley (his former employer), and Gregory Crewdson. But here, Florida’s landscape itself becomes a crucial subject. Inspired by the Farm Security Administration’s portrayal of American resilience, the Southern Gothic tradition, and the vibrant, folkloric palette of the Florida Highwaymen, ‘Florida Boys’ reimagines this state as a place of complex identity formation.
Additionally, Aronson confronts the darker histories woven into Florida’s past by exploring and responding to the visual archives of the Florida School for Boys. Through his engagement with these vernacular images, he grapples with the state’s painful legacies, reframing them into a vision that honors both the trauma and resilience embedded in the land and its people. ‘Florida Boys’ ultimately invites viewers to envision a Florida beyond its fraught histories and tense present-a place where memory, connection, and transformation shape a more hopeful future.
