South Florida has a way of sneaking into your bloodstream: slow, humid, and stubbornly resistant to the fast-twitch reflexes of big-city living. For PureHoney artist of the month Ryan Miller, the person behind the mysterious SNAILSPACE Instagram, moving here from New York at age 13 changed everything, from “how long it took to be handed my order at McDonald’s” to the speed of his footsteps. What started as culture-shock at the leisurely pace – including flip-flopped surfers telling him to “chill out” — eventually seeped into his work in the form of a snail.

First, they were minor details in larger compositions, but eventually they became full-blown muses. Now based in Lake Worth Beach, he is hosting SNAILSPACE, an exhibition there that asks viewers to do the unthinkable in 2025: slow down, stop scrolling, and linger. It is billed as “an immersive pop-up art show featuring paintings, prints, snails, sips, snacks, sculptures, and the passage of time.” It posits that time and attention, our most valuable currencies, should be conserved “in a world obsessed with hustle and urgency.”

Miller recalls his move to the Florida: “I’ll never forget the first couple of months. Everything literally slowed down … in middle school, walking through the halls with a new friend, he told me to slow down and that I was walking too fast. He said he could tell I was from New York, and that’s just not how they do it here. He wore flip-flops, had long hair, and was a surfer, of course. They know how to live properly.”

“I don’t know if it was deliberate, but not long after, snails started sneaking into my work,” he continues. “At first, as playful little Easter eggs, but also because they embodied this pace and perspective that felt opposite to the frantic hustle culture I’d grown up around. Over time, they went from hidden details to the central focus of an entire body of work. SNAILSPACE is the culmination of years spent thinking about time, stillness, and noticing the beauty in what people will step over without a glance.”

The mystery of SNAILSPACE is that it existed online for weeks without fanfare — just a watch-this-space Instagram handle with one or two images of snails posted. You could RSVP for details, though they remained deliberately scarce, But as opening night on Friday, October 24 nears, Miller opens up a little. It’s in downtown Lake Worth Beach. Yes, it’s an exhibition about snails.

More than that, he says, “It’s about giving yourself permission to step out of the rush, even for a moment. Whether someone comes away thinking about the texture of a painting, the curve of a sculpture, or just remembering the last time they saw a real snail after the rain.”

It’s also an analog exhibition. “For this show, I felt it was the right time in my life to get back to my traditional art roots — before Wacom tablets and iPads — putting a paintbrush to canvas,” Miller says. “Art created by humans (it’s weird that I even have to say that) is at a strange moment, with AI taking jobs from artists and designers alike.”

“In my industry,” says Miller, also the owner of Gatsby Printworks screen printing in Lake Worth Beach, “AI always meant Adobe Illustrator, not Artificial Intelligence. Choosing traditional media wasn’t just nostalgic for me, but it reinforced the show’s message. At the same time, the subject pushed me toward media that demanded that slowness. Every brushstroke is a record of time spent and decisions made in the moment … something a machine can’t replicate.

“I won’t lie,” he adds, “not having that Command Z/undo button took some getting used to.”

One concession to modernity: You have to visit a website to RSVP for the exhibition and learn its exact location. As of press time, opening was fully booked, but spaces were available for Saturday the 25th. Details on the Sunday session were likewise TBA.

That it’s happening in Lake Worth Beach makes sense: Miller is a Lake Worth hype man. “We’ve made it clear we’re an art town,” he says. “SNAILSPACE was born here, and I was adamant about finding a space for it here. It feels right to debut it in a community that already embraces slowing down to really look at art.”

Ryan Miller’s SNAILSPACE exhibition takes place Friday-Sunday, October 24-26 in downtown Lake Worth Beach, location TBA. www.snail.space ~ Kelli Bodle