“Who is a colored man?” a man named Depression queries from a spotlight on an otherwise dimly lit stage. A towering white billboard with the word “colored” written in all caps across it in black looms behind him. This question, along with the backdrop, set the foundation for Thoughts of a Colored Man, a new production from playwright Keenan Scott II and director Steve H. Broadnax III running now through November 10 at Baltimore Center Stage.

“I was very excited when Center Stage decided to add us to their season this year,” Scott shared during an artist talk with the cast moderated by Delegate Nick Mosby at the Reginald F. Lewis Museum of African American History and Culture last week. “Baltimore and the plight that young black men face here is very similar to how I grew up in the ’90s in New York. Baltimore was the perfect place for this piece.”

Though he is originally from Queens, New York, Scott spent the latter part of his adolescence in Southern Maryland. His history as a spoken word artist and experiences living in the suburbs of Washington D.C. and the bustling borough of Queens inspired many scenes in the play.

“My initial inspiration was to write a piece that really spoke to people from my generation,” he said, “People from the communities that I am from, and who really embody and encompass my family.”

Described by Scott as having “one theme, seven variations,” Thoughts of a Colored Man showcases snippets from the lives of seven black men presently living in gentrified Brooklyn, New York.

Each character has an allegorical name that represents a broad range of human emotions, including Wisdom (Jerome Preston Bates), Passion (Brandon Dion Gregory), Depression (Forrest McClendon), Lust (Reynaldo Piniella), Happiness (Jody Reynard), Love (Ryan Jamaal Swain), and Anger (Garrett Turner). The use of the names is an imaginative way to contextualize specific nuances of black masculine identity. “I did not see [those] stories when I was studying theatre,” Scott said.

Depression, whose story is one of martyrdom, is the only character who reveals his name early on. He gave up a full scholarship at MIT to assist his mother in raising his brother. His love for his family is unwavering, but he is constantly teased for the way he speaks, and he is insecure about his life and job as a clerk at Whole Foods.

He works to provide for his family, but despite the double shifts, his labor never changes their condition. The audience doesn’t learn the names of the other characters until the end of the performance, but it is through their dialogs with each other, and their internal monologues, that we learn why they are rightfully named.

Stripped-down props transform street corners into barbershops, and secluded parks into a grocery store. Ntozake Shange’s seminal play, For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide When the Rainbow is Enuf was another major inspiration.

Scott plays with language to illuminate a timely and longstanding discourse about the power of words, America’s history of racial categorization, and the burdened legacy of identity.

“There is a visceral response when we see the word ‘colored,’” Scott replied when asked why the billboard, which dominates the stage and towers over the audience, is such a prominent feature in the set design.

As James Baldwin noted in The Fire Next Time: “Color is not a human or a personal reality; it is a political reality.” The billboard is an inescapable reminder of that political reality. When asked what he hopes audiences will experience after viewing the play, Scott remained optimistic, “I hope people will walk away with more empathy.”

Tumble down the rabbit hole. Trip through an immersive installation. Stumble upon an interactive performance. At Hidden Paths: An Exhibition About Walking As Art presented by Cardinal in Bolton Hill, audiences can experience artist-led tours to experiential and visual artworks situated in communities around the gallery’s walls.

“We’re inviting people to go on these artist-led walks and learn from artists how to look at their neighborhoods,” says Alexander Jarman, Cardinal’s co-founder and curator. “Some people will be walking down streets they’ve never walked down before.”

With installments running through November 8, the exhibit features seven artists—many of whom are Baltimore-based—including Todd Shalom, Miguel Braceli, J$Fur, Malcolm Peacock, Ada Pinkston, and Graham Coreil-Allen. They offer a broad range of in-person and virtual tours designed to illuminate lesser-known facts and newly imagined encounters in the area.

The exhibition opened with an improvised tour from Shalom, founder of New York City walking-as-art festival Elastic City, which included a printed guide and talk about “tactics and strategies for how to show up and occupy a place when creating walking art.”

Throughout September, interdisciplinary artist J$Fur shared ambient soundscapes from around Baltimore, and Braceli and award-winning textile artist and MICA professor Susie Brandt hosted talks about their current projects. The last three tours in the series will be presented by conceptual artists Pinkston and Peacock, as well as visual artist Coreil-Allen.

During Peacock’s walk on Saturday, October 5 at 2 p.m., he will present “I Guess I’m Stuck With Me,” which he describes as “a work that explores themes of codependency and interdependency focusing on a range of lived experiences that took place in Baltimore between the years 2016-2019.” The interactive piece encourages audiences to come in pairs to the main branch of the Enoch Pratt Library with a fully charged cell phone (or device with internet access) and headphones.

“This work has to do with presence, physical presence and the absence of it,” Peacock says. “I want whoever experiences it to have an experience that places them in a position of reflection, but also urgency in regard to the ways they are navigating their past experiences—which are really palpable and alive in the present.”

At the conclusion of the tour, Peacock will post links to downloadable audio files so that others who could not attend can still have the opportunity to experience the work.

On October 19 at 2 p.m., trans-media artist Pinkston will present the “Post-Colonial Historical Monuments Tour Artist-Led Walk”—an interactive, ritual-based, performance on the corner of Mosher Street and West Mount Royal Avenue.

The work explores and interrogates the history of confederate monuments in Bolton Hill. During the performance, Pinkston will read excerpts from womanist scholars, including Audre Lorde and bell hooks, on a loudspeaker to facilitate dialogues about the relevance of confederate statues.

—Ada Pinkston

—Ada Pinkston

After the performance, visitors can grab a copy of Pinkston’s zine that documents participant responses to workshops conducted by the artist in Baltimore, Washington, D.C., and Dallas about the removal of confederate monuments.

Hidden Paths will conclude on November 8 at 7 p.m., with a 90-minute tour led by Coreil-Allen, a public artist and OSI Community Fellow. His piece titled, “Arches and Access Evening Wander,” leads audiences through Druid Hill Park. Attendees will meet the artist at the Druid Hill gates on Madison Avenue to, “explore monuments to community connectivity and a riptide of traffic priorities between the Druid Hill Park gate and the Jones Falls Expressway.”

The work is presented as part of The Access Project for Druid Hill Park (TAP Druid Hill), led by a coalition of artists, residents, city officials, and community partners to increase activation at the park.

Coreil-Allen is especially looking forward to exploring, “the challenging impacts of surrounding highways on local neighborhoods, engineering behind the ongoing reservoir construction, and efforts to better access Druid Hill through participator transportation planning and public art.”

When writer and director Terrance Smalls of local production company 89 Crowns first conceived Lost Kings, a new web series set in Baltimore City, he imagined it as social thriller. (Think Get Out and other films with narratives that explore real-world horrors.)

Baltimore’s history of police corruption and recent misconduct investigations by the Department of Justice and Attorney General could be the subject of many cinematic narratives, and Lost Kings offers its own perspective about how these issues plague the city.

“Corruption and violence were things I already recognized as happening in Baltimore,” says Smalls, who was inspired by stories from friends and city residents about the troubling tactics and problematic interactions they encountered with the city’s Dirt Bike Violators Task Force—an armed unit that polices local dirt bike riders.

The heroin of Lost Kings is a rider named Max, played by local dirt bike legend Lakeyria “Wheelie Queen” Doughty. After the murder of her brother Donte (William “A.J.” James, another well-known dirt biker), Max goes on a rampage to avenge her brother’s death, with those responsible also connected to drug trafficking and the police department.

There are clear parallels between the plot of Lost Kings and recent investigations into the Baltimore City Police Department. In 2018, James, the actor who played Donte, was shot and killed shortly after making the film. At the time, he was seeking an appeal for a charge he claimed to be innocent of.

Smalls’ considers Lost Kings a cinematic exploration inspired by harsh realities, and those depicted in Lost Kings have received polarizing critiques. Some have called the series an unnecessary revamp of The Wire. Others have criticized the film of relying on familiar stereotypes that present simplistic and negative depictions about Baltimore and its residents. At the same time, many have applauded the film for featuring real Baltimore residents instead of actors.

“When you look at the reality, I don’t believe [Lost Kings] is exploiting anything,” says Smalls. “It’s telling real narratives about things that are really happening.”

After an initial screenings at The Charles Theatre and Pipe Dreamz earlier this summer, Smalls plans to present more viewings of the series for the general public to garner more support for future episodes. And he encourages viewing audiences to watch Lost Kings with an open mind.

“Frankly, we aren’t often given shots to tell our narratives,” says Smalls. “I would like the film to [travel] everywhere… showing people that they can tell their own stories.”

From the mid-16th century through the late 18th century, the transatlantic slave trade transported millions of enslaved African people across the Atlantic Ocean to be sold for labor at ports across Latin America, North America, and the West Indies. Despite being uprooted from their native lands and dispersed across thousands of miles, cultural traditions were retained and passed down intergenerationally into modern day.

The Mare Projects art collective aims to explore that history and the dissemination of black art, culture, and community around the world through a new, nomadic residency program for emerging artists from Baltimore and beyond.

“I wanted to create a dialogue,” says curator Tiffany Auttrianna Ward, who conceived the project with scholars Nohora Arrieta Fernández and Tatiane Schilaro Santa Rosa. “Anti-blackness is internalized in the ways that we speak about the cities that we are from, especially if they are known for being black. A residency is a beautiful way to get people to learn about our differences and our [shared] experiences.”

During the initial residency, which took place in August and was hosted in collaboration with mTkalla Keaton, creative director of Sunspots Studio in West Baltimore, Mare commissioned Dominican artist Raelis Vasquez and Baltimore-based African-Americanartist Jerrell Gibbs to create new works that consider real and imagined visualizations of family through the diasporic lens, with selections now on view at Gallery CA from September 13 to October 13.

Both Vasquez and Gibbs are celebrated for their austere and expressive portraits of African-American and Afro-LatinX families, young adults, and children. The artists situate their subjects in intimate interiors and warmly rendered community spaces, with the resultant paintings standing as affirming counter-narratives against negative representations of black communities.

In Vasquez’s “La Vecina del Pueblo de Dios,” an oil work on canvas, for example, an unknown woman seated in a rocking chair lovingly feeds a small infant in a humble rural landscape, reminiscent of Catholic iconography that features the Virgin Mary holding Christ. In Gibbs’ “Window Seat,” an oil and acrylic work on canvas, an anonymous woman sits in a posh living room while two toddlers play behind her. Both works explore black motherhood as a mundane and sacred experience.

Ward hopes that the works created during the residency will spark critical dialogs about identity and culture. Although launched in Baltimore, future iterations will take place in host spaces in cities and countries across the diaspora.

“It’s about bringing us back together,” says Ward. “It’s about seeing each other and appreciating ourselves through our own lenses.”

Though a trained choreographer and artist, Sharayna Christmas first describes herself as an “activist and a nurturer” who feels compelled to continue a longstanding tradition of nurturing activism here in Baltimore. The exhibitions and initiatives that she collaboratively curates through her arts collective Necessary Tomorrowsare done with the intention of fusing art and experiential learning environments to uplift and inspire the city’s underserved communities.

In her latest exhibit, inspired by the activism of her own mother, the womanist movement, and the mentorship of elders, Christmas continues the work of highlighting the lives and legacies of black women, teaming with Kibibi Ajanku, curator-in-residence at the Frederick Douglass-Isaac Myers Maritime Museum, to launch We Choose, now on view in the museum’s Bearman Gallery in Fells Point through September 27.

“A lot of the artists that I work with have never been in an exhibition,” says Christmas. “I understand that I was once given an opportunity [and] I try to offer that same kind of support with my programming and the exhibitions that I curate.”

A group exhibition, We Choose showcases multimedia installations, oil and acrylic paintings, textiles, glassworks, photography, and assemblage from a dozen emerging artists whose work elicits distinct perspectives about black womanhood.

“I appreciate that when black women are in the same room, there are so many things that can happen; collaborations, rebirth,” says Christmas. “So here we are bringing together in a different capacity a new show that allows artists to define what ‘We Choose’ means for themselves.”

Those definitions are myriad and complex. In Kayla Morgan’s three-dimensional installation, Rosa The Riveter, the mixed-media artist reimagines the iconic World War I propaganda caricature of a similar name as a black hand that squeezes the muscles of a flexed forearm. The sculpture is set within a frame that is covered in ripped black and red bandanas, raising questions about racial disparities surrounding labor, as well as stereotypes about black and Latinx women’s unflinching strength and seeming invulnerability.

Meanwhile, Jazmine Johnson’s untitled photography installation, unpacks the ways black women’s bodies have historically been leveraged, commoditized, and sacrificed for others’ gain or civil liberties. Each photograph is named for a prominent writer, scholar, or activist, including Sonia Sanchez, Audre Lorde, Zora Neale Hurston, and Maya Angelou. Each depiction is charged with images of black women in the throes of protest and overlaid with text from radical quotes by each woman.

April Daniel Lewis’ black-and-white short film, Black Wash, is installed at the center of Johnson’s photographs. In it, a woman appears to be washing black paint or ink from her hands and arms, but upon closer review, the near 6-minute film is playing in reverse—the woman is washing the black onto her skin, rather than removing it. Lewis’s clever and satirical film flips racist tropes and mythologies that have likened melanin with dirt, and dark complexions with ugliness.

Queen, a subtle acrylic painting from a larger series by Victoria Rouse, turns its attention toward the discrimination that black women with natural hair face in conservative settings. The back of a head full of dreadlocks is surrounded by an ornate golden motif. Rouse’s subject does not confront the gaze of the viewer. Rather, we, the viewers, are confronted by their hair, a metaphoric crown.

We Choose is a small but compelling exhibition that gives a platform to rarely exhibited works by a collection of emerging artists. But the goal of this collection is larger than simply showcasing local art.

“Particularly for the artists, I want people to say, this is how I see myself, and I am sharing that with you without judgement,” says Christmas. “If black women can continue to drop the curtain and see themselves outside of an exhibition, in their own space, in their own mind, in their own spirituality, that would be enough for me.”

Inspired by pre-Abrahamic religious traditions from Asia, Africa, and the Caribbean, local multidisciplinary artist Oletha DeVane repurposes found objects to construct monumental spiritual sites. Her new exhibit Traces of Spirit, currently on view in the Spring House at the Baltimore Museum of Art, includes old and newer sculptural assemblages that have been reworked to establish an immersive spirit house—which is loosely inspired by Thai constructions believed to contain the spirits of protective entities.

DeVane’s spirit house serves as a homage to anticolonial liberation efforts, Juneetenth, the legacy of her father, and humanity’s tireless existentialism.

“In terms of looking at religion itself, it’s about how we as human beings are on this incredible search,” DeVane said during a recent studio visit. “It doesn’t mean that any one practice is wrong, it just means that we are all, as a world community, on different paths of searching for that ultimate spiritual essence.”

Traces of Spirit is an etheric exhibition that attempts to embody some of the metaphysical resonance that DeVane initially encountered while traveling to sacred sites around the world. The proximity of the installation to the viewers within the small house creates a deeply intimate and contemplative environment. Out of context, the installation could be interpreted as a meaningless experiment in ornamentalism. But DeVane’s work relies on contextualization beyond Western philosophies, and an openness to appreciate humanity’s attempts to comprehend and encompass the immensity of god.

The signature work, Saint for my City (2007-2010), an onyx black figurative sculpture reminiscent of Catholic statues of sainted martyrs, is situated in the center of the installation. The black saint sits on the apex of a decoratively embellished pillar laden with the names of immortalized African diasporic deities including Isis, Osiris, Horus, Ogun, and Dembala. There is a large snake that coils from the base to the top where the saint stands. The black saint is beautiful. Her crown of floating spheres evokes orbiting planets or stars. She is draped with a long cape that appears to float in mid-air.

There is something hopeful about the presentation of an astral-black holy figure. Imagine the impact such a figuration could have if it were installed around Baltimore City. Stories about the sacredness of the city and its inhabitants are often overlooked. (Most recently, our greatness has been reduced to rat infestation, poverty, and crime.) But those who live here and opt to stay here know that the city is more than its traumas. Baltimore is vibrant unbridled brilliance—charged invention and adaptation. DeVane channels that spirit of the city, its energy, and humanity through the black saint whose outstretched arms reach towards the doorway of the small house as if beckoning saint and sinner alike to find solace in her embrace.

Saint for my City is surrounded by four other smaller sculptural works, including Woman Who Married a Snake (2017), Spring (2018), Two Daughters (2007), and Health (Pilgrimage) (2018). Bottles, mosaics, masks, insects, and a host of other recognizable—and unrecognizable—objects recur throughout the pillar like sculptures. Each work holds layered narratives that include both global and hyper-local musings about the universal, ethereal, and distressing instances of everyday life. Many of the motifs are founded in Haitian and West African spiritual traditions, origin myths, and folktales.

“Many of the pieces are made with materials that I have gathered and things that really speak to me,” DeVane says. “For me, it’s really gleaning—trying to understand my religious experience and what it means to look at nature and those gods with respect.”

DeVane’s inclusion of those narratives stands as a miraculous reminder that despite slavery, and centuries of colonial violence, many of the traditions persist in modern African American communities. “I wanted something that really evolved out of my history and my understanding of what it meant to create.”

Two similarly elaborate large sculptural assemblages, Epiphany (2018) and Dumballa (2018), are installed on the wall behind the altars. A long string of translucent blue and highly reflective beads cascade down the wall between the two panels. Coupled with a meditative soundscape of gently flowing water and a shimmering projection that simulates soft waves, the installation triggers troubling and transformative histories about the volatile and life-sustaining nature of water.

“As a people, we traversed the waters and oceans, either because we were enslaved, or when we were moving around this world, because Africans are on every continent in every country,” DeVane says. “The water is a major conduit for movement and our ability to be everywhere. I look at water as a spiritual element. It’s the lifeforce of the planet and something that we need to take care of.”

Baltimore has a long musical legacy, from the legendary jazz clubs of Pennsylvania Avenue that featured the likes of Billie Holliday, Louis Armstrong, and John Coltrane, through the modern DIY scene that has incited national acclaim. But along the way, one of the city’s most vital music scenes—Baltimore Club—has largely gone undocumented, even as the energetic dance genre has come to define the grit, wit, and brilliance of its namesake city.

Decades Night Club finally brings that history into the spotlight. The exhibition, roundtable, and concert series, currently on display at The Peale Center in downtown Baltimore, highlights the city’s homegrown genre and the black-owned clubs that led to its golden era from the 1980s to the early 2000s. Curated by Mia Loving, founder and organizer of creative incubator Invisible Majority, Decades captures the scene’s spirit and energy through archival photographs, interviews with renowned DJs and regular clubgoers, and installations that celebrate former venues like the Paradox and Odell’s Nightclub. In doing so, it documents the impact this local sound had on contemporary music, in Baltimore and beyond.

We sat down with Loving to discuss the impetus for this exhibit, on view through August 11, and the importance of Baltimore Club.

Describe what Baltimore Club music is and how it has come to define Baltimore.

Doing this project made me realize how special Baltimore’s location actually is, and how its proximity to the Northeast, South, and Midwest has created a unique sound that [still] resonates. It’s literally birthed out of Chicago house, Miami bass, and hip-hop. It’s important to note that this meshing happened not from people listening to records or tapes, but traveling to clubs [to hear] touring artists. During this time, black artists weren’t being supported by the industry, they were creating their own lanes and building audiences through the clubs. My father [Baltimore Club DJ George Jones] has stories of bringing in rap acts like Salt-N-Pepa and Uncle Luke just as they were starting to pop.

What Baltimore Club songs and artists did you grow up listening to?

As an ’80s baby and ’90s kid, Baltimore Club music really took over—and that’s all that was everywhere. I was kind of snooty so I wasn’t really into it and didn’t go to clubs. After I moved away, I found a great appreciation for it. Growing up, you didn’t know who actually made the songs, but the radio DJs were the biggest celebrities to us. Frank Ski, Konan, Marc Clarke, Miss Tony, Reggie Reg, and later K-Swift were huge. My favorite songs were probably “Feel Me,” “Dance My Pain Away,” “Hey You Knuckleheads,” Miss Tony’s “How You Wanna Carry It.” High-school [era] Blaqstarr really took over with “Hands Up Thumbs Down,” “Get My Gun,” “Tote It,” “Supastarr,” “Feel It In The Air,” but most people thought those songs were by K-Swift.

How has gentrification effected black Baltimore clubs?

Gentrification has really killed black clubs. Particularly in Station North. Now most of the popular black clubs are in Baltimore County. The Chesapeake Shakespeare Company used to be a popular spot for black nightlife. Black clubs have often been the first attacked when a neighborhood is seeking to shift demographics.

Why is it important to archive the black Baltimore club scene?

We don’t celebrate this history at all. We look at the jazz clubs in Baltimore, and we honor that legacy. I think drugs, crime, and Reaganomics overshadowed the beauty of the [1980s to the 2000s]. [Artist] Sheila Gaskins pointed out that when we started to make segregation illegal, “black stuff” started to [be publicized as negative]. It’s important to me to not let the negativity overshadow the creativity—the business-savviness and innovation of black people in Baltimore. Also, from my ongoing [research], I see how, especially in the ’80s, we had more diversity in clubs. Some were just playing jazz, some just R&B, or hip-hop, and others club and house. That just doesn’t seem to exist now.

Founded in 1976 as part of the city’s annual Showcase of Nations, AFRAM—a free, two-day, family-oriented celebration of African American culture, community, and performance art—remains one of Baltimore’s most anticipated summer festivals.

“We invite not just Baltimoreans but everyone, young and old, to come experience a jam-packed weekend that honors the unique experience of African-Americans in Baltimore,” Mayor Bernard C. Jack Young shared in a press release about the event. “Our city’s culture of black excellence is no secret and we are happy to have this annual event to display and celebrate it.”

This weekend will mark the third year that Baltimore City Recreation and Parks (BCRP) hosts the event at Druid Hill Park. In an attempt to rebrand and reinvigorate the festival this time around, BCRP launched #AFRAMILY—a colorful social media campaign that spotlights short videos and interviews with local artists and entrepreneurs about their experiences living and working in Baltimore.

Featured Baltimoreans include Carleen Goodridge of Le Monade, The Voice star and recording artist Davon Fleming, MD State Senator of the 45th District Cory McCray, and nail artist Charlotte James of Power Decals.

“We are a majority black city, so AFRAM is such an incredible way to showcase our creatives and entrepreneurs,” James says. After years of fluctuating attendance, the 2017-2018 seasons saw a significant uptick in participation. “We expect an even larger crowd this year,” shares Whitney Brown, public relations officer for BCRP. “At Recreation and Parks, we are always looking for opportunities to reconnect the community with our spaces.”

With generous sponsorships from the likes of WBAL-TV, BGE, and Kaiser Permanente, AFRAM can once again bring some big names to Druid Hill Park. Celebrated musicians including Teddy Riley with Guy, Sevyn Streeter, The Combs, Wreckx-n-Effects, Kiana Lede, and our own Dru Hill will take the AFRAM Live Stage. And Rick Ross, one of the more anticipated performers, will headline the festival on Saturday, August 10. “Our lineup this year is phenomenal,” Brown continued. “I’m excited to see the crowd’s reaction to bringing Dru Hill back.”

Along with the stellar performances, attendees can browse a diverse selection of merchandise from local vendors, sample bites from food trucks, and enjoy a designated kids zone.

“Druid Hill Park is a place where a ton of family reunions are held,” Brown says. “AFRAM wants to remind folks of that feeling of reuniting with loved ones.”

Pennsylvania Avenue, better known as The Avenue to many Baltimoreans, has an illustrious history. Decades before the downtown and the Inner Harbor became nationally recognized tourist destinations, this diagonal stretch of city block fostered both thriving local businesses and nationally renowned arts and entertainment venues. Jazz legends like Billie Holiday and Duke Ellington performed at The Royal Theatre, Bamboo Lounge, Club Casino, and Club Tijuana. Meanwhile, Union Baptist and Bethel AME, African American churches built here in the 18th century, stood as critical community gathering spaces for political and spiritual counsel.

Today, few of these sites have been designated for historic preservation, and most of the institutions have been demolished. But in an effort to preserve what remains of The Avenue, and to revitalize the region at large, local community leaders have teamed up to found the Pennsylvania Avenue Black Arts and Entertainment District Coalition—which includes organizations such as Leaders of a Beautiful Struggle, the Arch Social Club, the Arch Social Community Network, Upton Planning Committee, Druid Heights Community Development Corporation, University of Baltimore Community Development Fellows Program, and more.

Earlier this month, all of the coalition’s hard work paid off when the Maryland State Arts Council (MSAC) designated The Avenue as one of the state’s official Arts and Entertainment Districts. The area includes 149 acres and nearly 15 blocks along Pennsylvania Avenue from Fulton Avenue to Dolphin Street, as well as two or three blocks east and west—making it the largest Arts and Entertainment District in the state and the fourth existing in Baltimore City. Among those in the state, it’s the only district dedicated to showcasing African-American arts and culture.

“We intentionally looked at the anchored institutions and the creative enterprises in the area,” says Lady Brion Gill, cultural curator for Leaders of a Beautiful Struggle. “We tried to make sure that we created a map that included all of those.”

The state’s recognition of the Pennsylvania Avenue District has the potential to ignite major revitalization initiatives in a neighborhood that has long been left to the wayside as other parts of Baltimore rapidly develop. “We know that people are interested in sit-down restaurants, galleries, and larger theaters in that area because all of the theaters have closed,” Gill says, mentioning The Royal Theatre and others. “Our hope is that we can curate a specific experience and identity in that area that will create the kind of arts and entertainment district that we all imagine.”

According to a 2018 Arts and Entertainment District Economic Impact Report conducted by MSAC, new businesses and events in designated Arts and Entertainment Districts supported over $1 billion in state GDP, and $72.1 million in state and local tax revenues.

The district’s constituents, including businesses, residents, and artists, will be able to take advantage of three tax incentives. The first pertains to property expansion, which will allow residential and commercial entities to expand or build new structures within the district. There’s also a personal benefit tax for artists who offer services or produce artistic works in the district, as well as a Personal Benefit Tax for district residents and those who work in an Arts and Entertainment district. In addition, an amusement tax incentive—which allows tickets to events in the district to be sold with no sales tax.

For the first time since MSAC launched the Arts and Entertainment District designation program in 2001, both Baltimore City and the state will provide funds that not only aid revitalization efforts in those districts, but also dedicate staff to help manage and facilitate future funding initiatives.

“We are really fortunate to be designated in a time when both the city and the state are willing to invest in the arts and entertainment districts in Baltimore,” Gill says. “We will also be seeking support from our local arts and philanthropic communities because we recognize that they are a part of making Baltimore City a destination.”

In partnership with community development corporations throughout the region—including the Westside, Druid Heights, and Upton CDCs—the Pennsylvania Avenue Black Arts and Entertainment District is working to create an application process and oversight committees that will vet new development ventures in the district. The groups will work together with developers to ensure that their ideas and interests align with the needs of current residents.

Details are still in the works, but this fall, the Pennsylvania Avenue Black Arts and Entertainment District is planning an event at the Reginald F. Lewis Museum to celebrate the designation and recognize all those who helped to bring the initiative to fruition.

“We want to protect the area to ensure that the demographics remain as they are now,” Gill says. “We want to make sure we are not gentrifying out the folks who currently live in the community.”

For decades, Ernest Shaw’s large-scale murals and mixed media portraits have been integral landmarks in Baltimore City. In 2017, Shaw was awarded the Ruby’s Artist Grant for Visual Art. The artist used those earnings to curate a series of community dialogs that interrogated stereotypes and presumptions about black masculinity.

Those conversations informed two large bodies of work: a series of mixed media works on canvas of historic African American cultural and political figures, and a collection of graphite works on paper that feature portraits of women who have experienced abuse or sexual violence. Selections from both of those series will be on view in the exhibition TESTIFY! A Life’s Time of Emerging Blackness, which debuts July 11 and runs at the Motor House gallery in Station North through September.

Inspired by Carvaggio’s use of light and shadow, as well as Dunbar and DuBois’ theories about the duality of black identity, Shaw immortalizes prominent thought leaders, creatives, and historic figures. Among them are James Baldwin, Nina Simone, Wole Soyinka, Thelonius Monk, George Stinney Jr., and Okwui Enwezor—along with others whose work and walk have indelibly transformed the world.

“The history of this country should be illustrated not just told.” Shaw shared during our studio visit. “I want people to ask questions. I want people to experience the work and to be activated by whatever they bring to the work.”

Shaw’s style is unmistakable. The portraits he renders employ rhythmic gestural marks and stand as polyphonic mixed media compositions that are as free and eloquent as jazz itself. His portraits riff on realist and surreal adaptations of mythic figures—outliers whose likenesses have been reproduced countless times. Sometimes, a reproduction can flatten rather than elevate a legacy.

Some artists crumble under the pressure to visualize lifelike depictions of cultural giants. How do you capture Monk’s moody-blue brilliance or realize the celestial countenance of Sun Ra in a two-dimensional painting? How can you encompass the cutting wit of Baldwin’s scholarship or the brooding radicality of Simone’s timeless anthems in a singular portrait? Shaw culls a history of transformative black creative genius to found new monuments that declaratively refuse to be forgotten.

The iconography that Shaw incorporates in his portraits draw from traditional African Diasporic spiritual systems that have been invoked to heal, transmute, and transcend our corporeal forms. Loosely sketched and realistically detailed renderings of Yoruba masquerades, Dogon symbols, and Guinea Monkey Masks, hover like protective apparitions behind and around his subjects. The masks serve as a tether that binds the 19th, 20th, and 21st century figures to precolonial African narratives.

In George Stinney Jr., (2019), a charcoal work on paper, Shaw renders a realist profile and front facing mugshot of fourteen-year-old George Stinney Jr., the youngest person in American history to be executed by electric chair. Stinney was accused of murdering two white girls in Alcolu, South Carolina in 1944. Though Stinney was convicted in just ten minutes, evidence erected seventy years after his execution exonerated his death and acknowledged his wrongful conviction.

American history is rife with these kinds of horrific injustices. Black children are regularly prosecuted as adults. Biases in the criminal justice systems presume the criminality rather than the innocence of black men and women. Shaw’s inclusion of Stinney among portraits of entertainers and scholars is telling.

“I want folks to look at the portrait and learn more about the story of George Stinney,” Shaw noted. “I want them to become more aware about the works of someone like James Baldwin or Nina Simone.”

The portrait is tinged gray and blue. The expression on the boy’s face is solemn and haunting. Stinney is Freddie Gray and Tamir Rice, and the countless others who have been killed before technology could be leveraged to enforce accountability. Despite our advances, Stinney’s portrait stands as a troubling testament about a legacy of perpetual systemic violence and disregard for black life.

In contrast, St. James on the Cross (2019), a golden hued acrylic portrait of James Baldwin on canvas shows the regality, power and tenacity of black identity. Baldwin is draped in a long ivory tunic highlighted with indigo and light blue patterns. He stands affirmed and unabashedly confident against a bright yellow background. His eyes directly confront our gaze. His poise demands our respect. A wooden sculpture hovers in profile over his left shoulder. A dripping sun rises above his right. Baldwin’s portrait is a stunning testament to a long tradition of creative genius.

The power of the images Shaw produces resides in the narratives he encourages us to consider. I asked him what he hoped viewers of the exhibition would walk away with. His answer was precise and direct, “Black folks are human.”

TESTIFY!, not only acknowledges an awe inspiring cadre of dynamic lives, it also emboldens us, the viewers, to reflect on the influence and impact of our collective history.

“If you can’t see the humanity in George Stinney’s life, Baldwins words, or Simone’s songs, then there are some things you need to work on,” Shaw says. “My engagement with the audience is to exhibit the humanity of melanated people. To hold up the mirror to other melanated people to say ‘I am beautiful, I have a story, a history, a culture, a language, a psychology, a cosmology, I am a part of that, I have all of that.’”

Hair Love, a new children’s book from filmmaker and former Baltimore Raven, Matthew A. Cherry and acclaimed illustrator Vashti Harrison, is a love poem to black girls and the fathers who help them stay fly.

The story follows Zuri, an imaginative toddler as she prepares for a very special day. Since every special day deserves a special look, Zuri asks her father to help her style her hair. After several endearing failed attempts, her father successfully creates a look Zuri can be proud of, a funky puff bun mohawk. “Daddy combed, parted, oiled, and twisted. He nailed it!” Zuri cheers in a sparkly pink superhero cape in celebration of her new look.

Inspired by a series of viral videos that featured black fathers styling their daughters’ hair, Cherry wanted to create a story that would present a positive narrative about black beauty standards and black fathers.

“Anytime you can, especially with young girls, show them that no matter what you or your hair look like, you are beautiful in your own way,” says Cherry. “Anytime you can normalize us in a way that [isn’t] looked at through a stereotypical lens, [or] you can show that black men are fathers, brothers, and we are friends—it all helps.”

Harrison’s charming illustrations declare a whimsical homage to black father-daughter relationships, and the magical versatility of black hair. Throughout the story, Zuri describes that her massive afro has a “mind of its own” because it “kinks, coils, and curls every which way.”

When her hair is braided with beads, Zuri imagines herself as an enchanting princess on the balcony of a jungle gym castle. When her hair is in two puffs, Zuri feels like a superhero who can fly through the clouds. These scenes are compelling because they relay a distinctly new narrative about the beauty and normalcy of chemical-free hair.

“I hadn’t seen those stories before,” Cherry says. “That’s probably part of the reason [the videos] went viral. There are a lot of misconceptions about black fathers—that we aren’t around or don’t care, but that is not the case at all. I wanted to let people know that these relationships happen every day. There are fathers who are doing that work with their daughters.”

This week marks the beginning of a national book tour to promote the book and a forthcoming animated film adaptation. You can grab a copy of Hair Love and speak directly with its creators this evening at The Children’s Book Store.

“Black women have had such a long and dramatic history with hair and how to feel comfortable with the natural hair that comes out of your head,” says Harrison. “If we can create a world where everyone is just fully comfortable and happy with themselves, I think that would be really beautiful.”

This season marks the 14th year of operation for the Reginald F. Lewis Museum of Maryland African American History & Culture. During its brief tenure, the museum has been marred with rumors of financial turmoil and organizational chaos that have overshadowed its accomplishments.

“This museum occupies prime real estate in the city and the state,” notes Jackie Copeland, who took on the role of executive director at the start of the year, “It is not just about the Reginald F. Lewis museum, it’s also about many other African-American cultural institutions who are not getting the support that they need to be sustainable. Whether that support comes from the state, city, African-American or majority communities, how you put that puzzle together will make a museum sustainable.”

Copeland, an accomplished art historian who brings more than 30 years of experience working in arts institutions to her new position, remains optimistic about her abilities to transform negative perceptions and reignite community engagement.

Modeled after the Smithsonian Institution’s National Museum of African American History and Culture, the Lewis was developed to honor the legacy of business mogul and philanthropist Reginald F. Lewis and to stand as a lasting monument for the archival and exhibition of regional African American histories. The museum has hosted a wide range of exhibitions and programming that chronicle local and national African-American histories, traditions, and contemporary artworks.

Recent exhibitions have included a collection of archival prints by Roland Freeman depicting the life of arabbers on Baltimore streets, an exhibition of more than 70 works by iconic artist Romare Bearden, and photography by Linda Day Clark celebrating the extensive history of quilting traditions in Gee’s Bend, Alabama. The museum also hosts a compelling discussion series entitled Talks and Thoughts, which has presented a broad range of timely issues including the legacy of confederate statues, the Civil Rights origins of Colin Kapernick’s protests, and the lasting impacts of black face and minstrel shows on contemporary culture.

“We want to be a place where the citizens of Baltimore and Maryland can see themselves and their histories,” Copeland continues. “The museum wants to be engaged in community activities, projects that increase children’s literacy, and also fine art exhibits.” We sat down with Copeland to discuss her career and vision to restructure the museum.

How are you hoping to transform the Reginald F. Lewis Museum?
I am the first director with museum experience to lead this museum. I am acutely aware of the finances that it takes to do a deep dive and to grow. My first obligation is to put in place a mechanism that will make this museum sustainable financially. That mechanism will allow me to step back and hire the folks who can go into communities to do the work of real engagement.

Can you describe your vision more specifically?
My vision is to grow the museum, but it takes time. I am really proud of the programs that we do. We are a small staff in a big museum. We call ourselves being flexible and relevant to issues that are relevant to Baltimore, the state, and national communities. Being able to be a place where safe conversations can happen is important for us. We call ourselves “a safe place for unsafe ideas.” We want to continue to have programs that acknowledge figures like Frederick Douglass, Harriet Tubman, and other contemporary artists that are from the region. We have a pulse in the community and align ourselves with movers and shakers who are community oriented.

What plans do you have to create stronger pipelines for community engagement? I am thinking specifically about communities who may not feel comfortable going to museums because historically those institutions have not always been welcoming to people of color.
That is a problem all museums face. I think that we have an advantage because we are a museum for African-American history and culture. My hope is that African Americans can find a place for themselves because their histories are here—that they are not hesitant to come here and feel comfortable here because these are the histories that we and our ancestors have lived. I think the challenge for this museum is to attract visitors of all ages, ethnicities, and genders so that people see that this is a shared history.

If we are showing the history of slavery, for instance, it isn’t just about what happened to African Americans, it is also an issue about majority white communities and their role. The challenge is how we talk about that, how we teach that, and how we engage teachers so that they feel comfortable and know how to discuss it when they bring their students. It is a challenge because, as a culture, we have not grown up always going to the museums, but I want this place to be not just a museum like a high and mighty temple or an ivory tower, but a community space. We kind of balance being a community space with being a museum of culture and being relevant is really important.

Moving forward, what are your hopes for the museum?
My hope is that when folks talk about the creativity and innovation that is happening in the city of Baltimore and speak about cultural institutions and museums like the BMA or the Walters, that they also talk about the Reginald F. Lewis Museum. Each one is distinctive, but we look at ourselves as having a voice for the African-American community. We should be recognized for the importance that we bring and the stories that we tell about the city and the state of Maryland.

In 1891, Harry T. Pratt became the first African-American student granted admission to attend Maryland Institute College of Art. More than 100 years later, MICA still struggles to equitably reflect the demographics of Baltimore City. Blackives, an exhibition and online database curated by senior photography student Deyane Moses archives the portraits and oral histories of black MICA students and alumni.

When Moses’ review of the school’s nearly 300-page autobiography yielded only one page of information about non-white students, Moses decided to create her own archival project. Armed with her camera and a desire to erect a new monument for underrepresented populations, Moses ventured to photograph every black student she saw on campus. Those random and serendipitous encounters rendered a portfolio of beautifully earnest portraits, candid moments that document students who often feel invisible. The gesture offers a vulnerable bridge to connect with others who may feel a kindred kind of isolation. To be a person of color attending a predominately white institution of higher education can be a solitary experience.

Blackives is a living history developed to affirm black students and instigate shifts in MICA’s established diversity and inclusion policies and practices. The popularity of the exhibition triggered a lengthy response from the school’s president, Samuel Hoi. In the memo, President Hoi acknowledged the segregationist history at MICA and vowed to “strive forward to fulfill its diversity, equity, inclusion, and globalization (DEIG) goals.” As a result, the exhibition was extended through March and reinstalled in the atrium of the school’s Main Building.

Shortly before the opening of Blackives, Moses and other black MICA students staged an intervention to memorialize Robert H. Clark, one of the first African-American students denied admittance because of his race. The intervention, Take Back the Steps, successfully blocked the entrance to the building for 63 minutes, one minute for every year black students were denied enrollment to attend. At the event, Moses issued a statement that contextualized a history of omission that few in the MICA community knew about.

We spoke with Moses and Clyde Johnson, associate dean at the Center for Identity & Inclusion about the exhibition, the community’s response, and their hopes for increased diversity on campus.

Blackives is an exhibition, but it is also an online database?

Deyane Moses: Yes. Maryland Institute Black Archives is the database which houses all the articles I found online, but I’m also collecting oral histories from the students who are currently here. The articles that I found from back in the day, the ways that they described black people, our voices were lost. The Afro supplemented for some of those voices, but they were around in the 1890s. So it was important to retrieve those voices now and to also speak to alumni and faculty. That’s how the project is moving forward, by looking at the past present and moving forward into the future. Many students at MICA don’t feel like they have support and mentorship.

What has the response been from black students and alumni about their experiences at MICA?

DM: They feel like they are not supported, especially when it comes to critiques. Classes are not that diverse. A lot of times I am the only black student in my photography classes. For the first time in my senior year, there are three other senior photography students in the same class with me. We talked about that. I also went to the black student union and talked to them about the low retention rate of black students at MICA. The show has been well received and everyone wants MICA to do more for black students and to support them.

Why now is the school and President Hoi speaking up about this issue and how will it effect the school’s approach to increase the diversity of its faculty and student body?

Clyde Johnson: We have just ended a nearly three-year president’s task force on diversity, equity, inclusion, and globalization. It entailed auditors looking over policies and programs regarding students of color, our LGBTQIA communities, and every aspect of diversity. We just did that and we’ve created a hopefully powerful document that should now be in implementation phase. These are new policies, new hiring guidelines. We have heard students say that the school does not have enough faculty members of color. So we have hired trainers to learn about implicit bias in the hiring process. I think we are working in tandem with this conversation. What Deyanne’s exhibition has done is reminded us that the work we are doing is urgent. Here’s the history, let’s do the work.

I love that the exhibition looks like a living room and the wall of student portraits feel like members of your family.

DM: The majority of the portraits are of undergrad and graduates and my mentor, Colette Veasey-Cullors. They are my family. Everyone was really supportive. If they had a second, they let me take their portrait. I just asked that they focus and look at me so that, when others saw the wall, there would be a strong presence—they would know that we are here. The wallpaper is inspired by the 1890s, when the first black graduate, Harry T. Pratt, started. I wanted the feeling of home but also an awareness that you were in a museum.

You received some criticism from some students and staff about covering the statues in the Main Building with black curtains.

DM: I love this building, but I always noticed the white sculptures. Black people are not in those histories. I asked that they be covered, out of respect for black history as important by itself, outside of those histories. Some people are really upset about it.

What are your hopes for the exhibition?

DM: I would like it to be a permanent fixture somewhere in MICA and for the database to continue. I hope this is the beginning of other colleges admitting their histories so they can make change there, as well.

Beauty goes beyond gender. S/he Handsome, a new collection of pastel and acrylic figurative portraits by S. Rasheem continues a series of womanist works that decolonize standards of beauty. Each portrait realizes black masculine-of-center women in affirming ways. The term “masculine of center” was originally coined by social activist and entrepreneur B. Cole to encapsulate the intersectional facets and broad spectrum of lesbian/queer/womyn whose gender identities are more closely aligned with masculinity.

S/he Handsome, opening February 8 at Jubilee Arts, makes a resounding declaration about the complexities of identity—mainly that black, queer representation matters. We got a chance to talk to Rasheem about why the definition of certain words matter, what inspired her series, and what impact she hopes her portraits will have.

What inspired the series?
A few things, first, the absence of seeing masculine-of-center women. My desire is to make their experiences more visible. Often times when I see black women in visual artworks, they are usually hyper-feminine, hyper-sexualized and I wanted to portray them as beautifully, strongly, handsomely as they really are. All of the women in the portraits use she/they pronouns and identify as bois. I like that traditionally marginalized and objectified persons become the subject and bring viewers in to become the object, because they are like “I see you seeing me.” So, it’s like we are all in the picture together.

Handsome is such a specific term in relation to gender and masculinity.
The use of handsome was very intentional, because the goal is to interrogate the conversation about who gets to be called masculine. Handsome seems to be used as a very gender-specific term, and women are not particularly seen as “handsome” and thought not to be able to be handsome. I think sometimes earlier from being around friends or partners and people wanting to articulate that they found them attractive, and feeling like handsome was misplaced. I wanted to purposefully say, no, they are handsome, we don’t have to search for another word.

If I had to say one thing about the body of work, each of them are saying, “I am not trying to be noticed, but I refuse to be ignored, I am here. [I’m] not going anywhere; in all of my strength, all of my beauty, all of my handsomeness.”

Who are the people in these portraits?
None of the women are people who came to model for me in a particular studio. These are people who be in everyday life, this is how they show up and present themselves to me and to the world. It was very important to me that I honored that and showed that. These aren’t costumes. To the degree that masculinity is performative; this is something that comes out of their being.

Why is it important to exhibit portraits of black masculine-of-center women?
Representation absolutely matters. I feel like there is a politic that is occurring around this battle between self-identity politics and acknowledgement politics. It’s important that they are seen, hear, and represented. I find it troubling, the lack of representation. It does not in any way gel with all of the places that these women show up every day—whether it’s your barber, or the officiant who married you, or the truck driver who brought you goods.

At minimum, I want the women to be seen and I want you to identify them in the way that they choose to be identified. I also want to provide a counter narrative around what it means to be masculine or female bodied. I want them to be seen through a particular lens that isn’t tragic, scarred, or hurt. I want to show them in ways that I see them: strong, bad ass, here, visible, present.

Think about the main characters of films you recently viewed. How many of them were black women? How many had black female actresses as lead protagonists? How many were directed by black women? One or two may come to mind. Try to name 10. Are you having difficulty?

In response to the blatant inequity black women creatives face, filmmaker and writer Nia Hampton founded The Black Femme Supremacy Film Festival. The festival aims to promote dynamic cinematic efforts from Black female/femme identified filmmakers as well as “shake up the notoriously elitist culture of film festivals.”

This Sunday, January 20 at 5 p.m., the Creative Alliance will host “Taste Test: A Night of Short Films,” as a preview for the second installment of the festival, coming in the fall of 2019. Cinephiles can experience selections from Cuba, Brazil, South Africa, Canada and the United States that center “the black femme as a global protagonist.” A panel discussion with Hampton and some of the filmmakers will follow.

In 2018, the call for a more inclusive cinema grew too loud to ignore: more women and people of color as lead protagonists, directors, crew members, and writers. Hollywood’s decision to take heed proved to be incredibly profitable. Films like Black Panther, Mudbound, Bright, Moonlight, A Wrinkle in Time, If Beale Street Could Talk, and Get Out, among others, broke longstanding misconceptions about the earning potential of films with more people of color. The commercial success of those films set a new standard that has taken decades to acknowledge—national audiences will support great films even if they do not feature white male protagonists.

Despite these modest victories, inequitable casting and hiring of nonwhite actors and directors persists. UCLA’s recent research publication, 2018 Hollywood Diversity Report revealed that only one in 10 film directors are people of color and less than one out of 10 film directors are female. The Center for the Study of Women in Television and Film concludes that, of the top films in 2017, just 16 percent of female characters were black and only 7 percent were LatinX. DataUSA confirmed that more than 80 percent of American producers and directors are white, an overwhelming majority are male and just 7.78 percent are black.

With these disparities in mind, we chatted with Hampton about the importance of black women filmmakers, how she defines femme, and her hopes for the evolution of the festival.

The Black Femme Supremacy Film Festival is a powerful title. How are you defining femme?
Femme is such a loaded term because we know that not all women have female genitalia and that not all women describe themselves as feminine or feminist. A femme person knows that they are femme regardless of how they look or how others may perceive them. But I’m also thinking about feminine boys who had to fight. I’m thinking about dark-skinned black women, who had to overcompensate to be seen. I’m thinking about naturally black women, who aren’t comfortable with the way people treat them.

[The films] are presenting characters who may be seen as femme. The directors are women, most are black, but the idea is that what you are watching on screen is a femme-identified person, their experiences, and what they are going through.

Why do you believe that it is important to present narratives that center black femmes?
When it comes to Hollywood, those films are not enough for me. When I was young, I got to see women be protagonists and femme-identified folks be feminists, but I think some things still need to be changed. I loved Black Panther and I love that it was made. Letitia Wright and Lupita Nyong’o, their roles were great, but I want to see films just about them. I’m looking for more femme heroes and protagonists to watch. I also know a lot of black female filmmakers but feel like, if I’m not in New York or in film school, I don’t get to see their work. Film is such a male-centric medium. It’s easy to go to a film festival and not see women making films. As a female filmmaker, I need to know that other people are doing this as well.

“Taste Test” will show short films from different countries. I made a short that I shot in Brazil. The shorts all cover different subjects, different genres. We will continue to center films by and about black women or folks who are femme-identified.

How do you hope the festival will evolve?
I want to create something that is operated by regular people. I would like to see my film festival accessible to black women who are not necessarily filmmakers. A lot of film festival culture is tied up in classism and elitism. You usually have to have enough money to make a film and then sell it and that kind of cuts out many black women from jump. I would like to host workshops and networking opportunities and really be a community for people. I really want to make a space where people are interacting and making films and really be a part of the process.

There are approximately 16,692 vacant properties in Baltimore City as of December 31, 2018, according to data culled from the Housing Authority. But 2018 Warnock Foundation Innovation Fellow Nneka N’Namdi says that’s just scratching the surface.

In order to more accurately report information and, ultimately, find solutions to combat blight, the Upton resident developed an initiative called Fight Blight Bmore, which endeavors to reduce blight and increase home equity for Baltimore residents.

“How can we support community-oriented solutions to eliminate blight?” N’Namdi asks. Decades of systemic disinvestment in working poor communities in Baltimore City have resulted in what she considers to be “community-based trauma resulting in long-term stress from fear of unsafe property implosion, toxic exposure, and crime.”

FBB hopes to combat these issues and others related to the racial, economic, and environmental disparities that impede home ownership. We spoke with N’Namdi to learn more about her initiative’s strategy to end blight in Baltimore City and beyond.

What prompted you to create Fight Blight Bmore?
Back around Mother’s Day 2016, I witnessed young people being inadvertently endangered by a demolition site, a four large brownstones on Fremont Avenue and Lafayette Street, that didn’t have a sign. Watching the children walk and ride down the street without the benefit of a barrier gave me pause. I started investigating why there wasn’t a gate between the walkway and the site, why we had the vacant properties, and what was the city’s plan.

And what information did, or didn’t you find?
I found a need to have a ready tool to report unsafe building structures to the city. There was a lack of community developed solutions to remediate blight that wouldn’t result in significant displacement of communities. Community development in Baltimore and many other old industrial cities—Philadelphia, Chicago, Detroit, St. Louis—results in total gentrification of neighborhoods, which is traumatic.

A lot has to do with communities having access to data about blight to create solutions that will be most impactful, sustainable, and least damaging to the people. It isn’t just that the buildings look bad; it makes you sick, exposes you to crime, raises rent. If you think of it as it just looks bad, you can’t think of the root cause of the issues.

How are you defining blight?
The definition we use is the presence [or] concentration of vacant, abandoned, dilapidated, underutilized or mis-utilized buildings, spaces or lots, non-jurisdiction specific. Baltimore City has a definition, but their definition is convoluted and doesn’t take into account anything other than vacancies. It doesn’t count underutilized or misused spaces like recreation centers, schools, churches, or retail storefronts. Because of that, the city’s actual number of blighted properties is possibly three-times the reported number.

Removing blight in Baltimore City is a huge endeavor. Will you collaborate with other initiatives?

Yes, many people are doing related work. [Blight] impacts public health, public safety, and the economy. Sandtown South, No Boundaries Coalition, Conscious Development Roundtable, Black Church Food Security Network, Black Yield Institute, City Weeds, Juan Nance with Healthy People Juice, and Baltimore Housing Roundtable. It’s a lot of crossover efforts.

What impact do you hope FBB will have against blight the city?

The city is aware that there is a problem, but the way they calculate the problem minimizes the seriousness. Like most municipalities, they attempt to use the same tools that created the problem to solve the problem. To adequately address blight, you have to address the core cause of blight, which is racism.

You hear people talk about it, but it isn’t critical mass enough to confront that history in Baltimore as it applies to property management across race and class. The city has a number of efforts, like Vacants to Values and Live Baltimore, but none of those things address the core problem. Things like TIFs, Community Development Block Grants, and Opportunity Zones, they are not beneficial to communities.

So what are you hoping to do differently?

My hope is that we create a model that people in the community can use for themselves. A lot of times people in communities, specifically black people because of the legacy of inequity in land ownership, don’t feel comfortable buying property and redeveloping without seeing someone else as a model do it in their communities. So that’s what I did.

Every step of my process I share with other people so that they can see that anyone can do this, if you have a willingness. We can pull together resources to do this work to create inner-community systems. Every portion of my process involved paying black- and women-owned businesses—from the appraiser to muralist. That creates vibrancy. My ultimate outcomes are that we do not see displacement in our communities and that people who have lived in these communities for the last 50 years get to feel healthy and safe.

Three years ago, artist Jerrell Gibbs was developing a series of acrylic paintings that revised characters from Charles M. Schulz’s Peanuts. Gibbs mimicked Schultz’s playful illustrative style, but created nuanced narratives that centered around the life and experiences of Franklin, a silent African-American characterization. His paintings reminded us that—while Franklin’s inclusion was well-meaning—his silence, lack of character development, and nonexistent independent story arc were telling reflections about a culture that normalized banal representations of black identity.

As Gibbs now studies in the rigorous Leroy E. Hoffberger School of Painting M.F.A. program at MICA, the scenes he chooses to visualize reflect broad humanizing narratives about mundane instances in black life: smiling children watching television or swimming, young women posing for prom pictures, mothers and young sons sharing intimate conversations on a couch. In these works, Gibbs engages a mature style that meanders between intricately rendered realist figurations and free-form gestural strokes reminiscent of works by artists like Alice Neal, Henry Taylor or John Sonsini.

Some of his newest paintings are currently on view at Ida B’s Table through January 31, 2019, as part of the restaurant’s monthly rotating exhibit, Necessary Tomorrows. We got a chance to visit Gibbs in his studio to view his latest series of oil work on canvas and discuss how his work has evolved over the years.

What inspired this body of work and the evolution in your work?

School and me challenging myself to be a student of all the things I want to master. I want to do this for the rest of my life. If I continue down this path, I want to evolve and dive into the practice of painting and learn what it is to be a really significant artist. I want to continue to grow, master my craft, and be a student of the game first. I’m taking the time to research a lot of the things I have learned in school and figure out ways to get better. Even if it’s not something that is easily recognizable, I know overtime that it is something that will start to manifest.

In many of your portraits, you use very gestural style that leaves sections blank or less realized than others. Why does this aesthetic recur in this new series?

Me not knowing the individual [in the paintings] forced me to not want to get too involved with every minute detail. I don’t think that was necessarily important. The person wasn’t important. It was the environment, the space, and the reaction—everything that was given besides the actual person. The emotion of the imagery, that was what was important. I’m working on not being bogged down by detail.

For “Studying God’s Word,” in particular, it’s unfinished but so is youth. The whole idea of growing up and continuing to learn and taking what you know and applying it to what and who you are at that moment in your life and continuing to shed other things, layers, adding subtraction. That whole notion of youth, growing, maturing is like a play with that whole dialogue. Also just showing the layers of people. We are all a work in progress and so is this painting.

When you were first playing with allowing underpainting to bleed through, there was something about it that didn’t feel as fully resolved as it does now. There’s something about it that feels like a homage to black memory. Is that your intention?

Absolutely. It’s a way to allow the process to be shown just so it can have a dialogue with what it is to be human, continuing to be vulnerable, being okay with the process, and figuring out a way to allow the undertone to function. To pay homage from where you come from and how you’ve allowed those things to mold and shape you into the being that you are. It’s bigger than just showing it, there is a function, a reason for how it operates within each piece. It’s not necessary for every painting, but when it necessary I know when to incorporate it.

It’s refreshing and very powerful that you focus on the innocence and humanity of black youth.

It’s something that I’ve been working with for years. Even though the body of work had changed, the contexts with which I place these people is strategic. Normalizing us being and existing. Everybody isn’t an entertainer, everybody doesn’t have to be glorified for their contribution to America in its entirety, just being you is enough. I want to acknowledge that and bring that presence to museums, galleries, and people so that they can view these experiences.

To call Delita Martin’s art merely portraits would be doing them a disservice. Her works stand as inspiring monuments to living and late black women in her family and extended community.

At the core of her exhibition Between Sprits and Sisters—on display at Galerie Myrtis through February 2, 2019—is a desire to “capture the spirit of a person,” as she says, more than just relay a photorealistic representation.

Martin’s unorthodox approach to portraiture and distinctive aesthetic cleverly juxtapose myriad printmaking techniques with drawing, painting, sewing, and her own symbolic flourishes to create fantastical, spiritually intoned black figures. Martin uses grand embellishments, dense layering of geometric patterns from relief or callograph prints, decorative papers, and hand-stitching to realize intimate scenes of black women’s encounters with ethereal realms.

The worlds Martin illustrates are startlingly beautiful, meditative, and reveal the artist’s ever-expanding mastery of the mediums she engages. We recently talked to the artist about her latest work, spirituality, and the impact of the collection on the canon of portraiture.

What inspired the creation of Between Spirits and Sisters?

It was really a combination of things. Me wanting to grow in my work. It’s always about how do I expand the conversation? How do I continue to talk about the women in my community and the things I want to say and talk about? Also, in terms of working with material, how do I push the envelope as far as processes that I use? I moved from Little Rock back to Texas with my family and I’m interested in how my current environment impacts the work that I have and I’m really allowing that to come through and show in my work.

What’s really beautiful about the work is that those patterns and textures that recur really do create the feeling of another world, a spirit world or otherworldly dimensions. When did you begin to visualize the spiritual world as densely patterned landscapes?
Early on . . . I didn’t want to get in the studio and just be a printmaker or just a painter, or draftsman. I wanted to create, to be an artist. I began to bring all of the different processes together and really marry them. It was really difficult. You learn these different processes in school, but if you are a painter, you are a painter. If you are a printmaker you are a printmaker, I realized that I didn’t have to be any of those things or I could be all of those things.

In terms of the ideas and the development of how did I get the figures in the work, I really began to tell more of my own personal story. Not that other works weren’t personal, but I think that I was concerned with representations of the entire community. But with this body of work you begin to see myself in the work as well as my close family members and extended family. I’m actually drawing them as I see them which was new for me. I never worked from models before and now I am, and its really added a different dimension to the work.

I began to think about how women navigate the spiritual realm. What does it visually look like when we pray? What does it look like when we meditate? What does that look like for me? In terms of the veil, that space between the spiritual and the waking world, what does that look like? The patterns make sense to me.

You’ve spoken about walking into your studio and having a guidance, or hearing a voice, or having the works reveal themselves before they are made.
I am really a vessel or a tool that this message comes through. When I am in the studio, I will come in or have an idea or I will say “I want to work with a full figure.” Or “I want to work with just a portrait today.” That is really as much information as I have when I come into the studio. Once I start working, I may start on the pattern or background first and that determines the figure. Once I get the figure roughed in, I usually start with the facial features and then from that point on everything tells me what to do next.

How do you hope that your work will contribute to the greater canon of portraiture?

I want it start and continue a conversation about what portraiture is and what it means. I’ve always been interested in the figure, drawing the figure and portraits, I didn’t know where I was going with it. I was maybe a sophomore in college and I went on a field trip with my class . . . and we visited stained-glass artist Jean Lacy. We walked into her home and she had all of this beautiful artwork and she had one picture that was a portrait of her done by John T. Biggers. It looked nothing like her, but when you saw it you instantly knew who it was because he had captured her spirit. I knew at that point that was what I wanted to do.

I don’t have an interest in hyper realism. I would use a camera if I did. I’m really interested in capturing that moment, the twinkle in your eye, the slight smile that is known only to you, the simple gesture of your hands. Those are the things I want to capture. I want the essence of who you are.

A placard hangs in the foyer of the historic Arch Social Club that reads: “We are strong, moral men who believe in service to our community, preservation of our culture, friendship, and brotherly love.” Founded in 1905 by African-American professionals Raymond Coates, Samuel Barney, and Jeremiah S. Hill, the club is one of the oldest b men’s social clubs in the U.S., and one of the few remaining black-owned organizations to have operated while Pennsylvania Avenue was still nationally recognized as a hub for arts, culture, and entrepreneurship.

The club—which continues to serve as a cornerstone of culture, civics, and commerce for African-American communities in Baltimore City—recently won a $118,000 financial award from the National Trust for Historic Preservation to restore parts of the building back to its original grandeur.

Kaleb Tshamba, chairman of the Board of Trustees, gave me a tour of the club, which he hopes the city will support more in the future. “We’ve always been a part of the community, never left the community,” Tshamba said. “That’s why during the Uprising, we stayed open.”

The foyer also features a small exhibit of archival prints and articles about historic achievements made by black Baltimoreans. “They were doctors, lawyers, organizers, activists, Arabbers, carpenters—we had all of them,” Tshamba shared about club membership. “A lot of [us] were in the military,” he points to several pictures of young servicemen in their uniforms. “That’s me there!” he beams at a handsome image of himself in his early 20s. “We are warriors.”

Many of the portraits displayed are of founders and early members of the club who were prominent leaders in Baltimore City. Well known figures include Harry Syth Cummings, Baltimore’s first black City Councilman who was instrumental in getting segregated African-American K-12 schools renamed after prominent figures, and raising awareness about the importance of black voters. Then there was A. Philip Randolph, a civil rights activist, organizer of the March on Washington Movement, and founder of the Brotherhood of Sleeping Car Porters.

Of course, Paul Coates, founder of the Black Classic Press publishing company and father of scholar Ta-Nehisi Coates, is among the many important figures recognized. “To be a member of our club you could be a Democrat, Republican, atheist, Black Nationalist, we didn’t discriminate,” Tshamba continues, “As long as you were about community building, uplifting our community, that is what we all had in common.” That the 113-year-old institution survived Jim Crow, redlining, the Baltimore riot of 1968, or contemporary gentrification, is nothing short of miraculous.

Tshamba points to a portrait of John Kier, another early member of the club, who was the conductor of the big band, the Melody Boys. “Cab Calloway played with the Melody Boys before he went to New York and became famous,” he notes. We walk through the Raymond Coates Lounge and enter the Billie Holiday Room, a small ballroom with tables, seating and a large stage, a larger ballroom on the second floor is named for Calloway.

“Bands would be playing right here,” Tshamba points towards the stage in the Billie Holiday Room where legends like Holiday, Calloway, and Duke Ellington once performed. “Every time Duke Ellington would come to town, they would come here to play. All the black entertainers from all over the United States came here to Baltimore.” he continued. “All the black movie stars came here to Baltimore [and] to the Royal Theater. All of that is torn down now. It should have never been torn down.”

There is an old West African Proverb that notes, paraphrasing here, when an old man dies, a library burns to the ground. The Arch Social Club is one of the last standing archives dedicated to the preservation of critical local histories about early affluent African Americans. The club is part of an on-going initiative, led by “Lady” Brion Gill, cultural curator for Leaders of a Beautiful Struggle (LBS), to reestablish an African-American Arts and Entertainment District on Pennsylvania Avenue. “To lift up a nation,” Tshamba said, “you have to lift up your people.”

New York based-interdisciplinary artist Gerry Mak’s exhibition, Atomic Banana: Emotion and Hierospliffics, explores the mania of nationalist propaganda and its influence on the formation of the artist’s Asian-American identity. Mak considers derogatory terms like, “banana,” a slur used to describe people of Asian heritage who are born or raised outside of Asia, as well as ideologies associated with masculinity, nationhood, and pop culture to enunciate his personal struggles with information overload. The exhibit is on display now through December 1 at Waller Gallery.

Mak invokes a hallucinogenic aesthetic that remixes familiar iconography associated with American and Chinese nationhood— sports cars, flags, stealth fighters, space shuttles, weed paraphernalia, among other imagery, unpack his concerns about the irreverence of nationalism, capitalism, and patriarchy. The artist created “hierospliffics,” a stoner riff on the Ancient Egyptian writing system to deconstruct academic socio-political discourse into easily recognizable, but densely weighted symbols that confuse and disrupt their intended use as propaganda.

We recently got a chance to speak with Mak about what inspired this exhibition and what is work evokes about Asian-American culture in general.

How has your background informed your art?
A lot of it has to do with my identity and how I piece it together being a child of immigrants, a non-white person and how I’ve been drawn to symbols aesthetics and those kinds of propaganda and images [in] pop culture to try and inform my own narrative about myself and how I understand myself. I was thinking a lot about militarism, nationhood, national identity and how that is enforced with tech and the military. I wanted to be an astronaut when I was a kid. I watched the Challenger blow up when I was a kid. All of these things are part of my story.

My whole life I’ve been feeling apocalyptic and that the realities that we agree on are usually faulty and contradictory and very thinly propped up. Psychedelia is something that is really modern, contemporary, very American. Hippie culture and LSD has permeated everything. Growing up on Ren and Stimpy, even if you don’t consume drugs it’s so pervasive in our culture. It’s hard for it to not come out in the work. It’s hard to feel lucid about [it all] in the process. I’ve also been reacting to the overly cerebral rational kind of academic art which I have always been drawn to, [that is] very expressive and vulnerable.

The Destroy series, installed in Waller’s back gallery, are all black light reactive paintings. It is rare to see black light used outside of party scenes in a high art context or as a tool for political critique.
There’s something really tacky about black light. There’s a whole genre of poster art that is black light. I never saw it in an abstracted way or experimental. That whole series was spawned . . . it was the beginning, the earliest pieces in the work. I wanted to break free from representational, illustrative work, and be more expressive. That’s how those evolved and came about and one of the Destroy pieces, the character recurs. The character for “destroy” is on condemned buildings all over China [and] Beijing. It became a symbol for contemporary China. It’s a punk looking symbol. I’ve always been influenced by punk. It’s not anarchy and skulls, its actually used for practical reasons in China. [The character literally] translates to “disassemble, take apart.”

In your acrylic and spraypaint works, you appropriate the Chinese flag and Hong Kong flag and make something entirely new. What influenced those works?
I think a lot about how much people can identify with a flag. HK@NIGHT looks like a flower, [but] is the Hong Kong flag in black and white. It’s only been in use since 1997. My mother didn’t even recognize it. I feel like every place we’re talking about—China, Hong Kong, Europe, U.S., Africa, everywhere—there is a struggle with the idea of a national identity. Should there be one, is it possible to have one without historical grievances? The Hong Kong flag is 20 years old. How do people form attachments to things that are so young?

Africa Umoja—The Spirit of Togetherness is a beautiful musical about the history of South Africa told through the musical traditions that have shaped the country. “Umoja,” a Swahili word for unity, is a fitting title for a vibrant and culturally expressive theatrical work.

Audiences have a chance to learn more about South Africa’s vibrant musical legacy with a limited run through October 28 at the historic Hippodrome Theatre.

“It’s very important to show my history especially in South Africa, because for many years it’s been excluded because of apartheid,” said co-creator Todd Twala. “A lot of people don’t know about my country because we were in seclusion. We were taught a very different history.”

Started as an advocacy and leadership initiative for young South Africans who struggled with homelessness and school retention, the Africa Umoja initiative later evolved into an extravagant production that allowed its participants to travel outside of South Africa to share their powerful dance traditions around the world.

“There was a need for me to teach the youth of South Africa about where they come from musically around dance,” Twala continued. “All over the country they adopted foreign clothes. It was important to teach them who they were and where they came from musically.”

Africa Umoja features dances from the rural countryside of South Africa, the booming metropolises of Johannesburg, and regions in between. The performance includes mourning songs and movements of women whose husbands left them to find work, the slapping gumboot dances of miners, the snake dances of Venda girls on the verge of adulthood, and some contemporary dances from South African youth.

The show chronicles South African history by recalling memories from the life of musician and performer Penuel Bhekizitha Ndaba, lovingly known as “Hope.” Though Hope passed away in 2014, a cast member stands in his place as a narrator who explains cultural nuances and expresses, with great pride, the music that helped black South Africans overcome overwhelming oppressions.

Hope also serves as a transitional guide who contextualizes the sociopolitical issues that influenced the musical traditions of each era. “Our music is like our country—it is growing,” Hope notes as a cast of dancers and drummers take over the stage.

All of the cast members give high energy, invigorating performances that not only highlight the sophistication and dexterity of Twala’s choreography, but also showcase a nuanced representation of dance traditions that are rarely exhibited outside of South Africa. One of the first scenes that opens the show featured Sangoma, Zulu healers, and shaman who communicated with ancestral spirits through a chorus of drumming and songs. Men in full Zulu regalia stomped the ground and kicked their legs up towards the sky. The thunderous sound of drums and feet coalesced with the melodic voices of the men. In those moments, the audience became witness to something sacred, an experience that needs no translation.

That feeling of being a part of something special, not just a passive member of the audience, persisted throughout the over two-and-a-half-hour performance. Each scene established how the dances and fashion of South African communities evolved over time, post-migration from rural communities to the city, through police violence and apartheid, into the contemporary moment.

“We are living in borrowed times, we need to support each other, look after each other, help each other embrace each other instead of pointing fingers,” Twala said. “The weather is changing. The world is changing. There is no time for all of this craziness. My wish is that when people see the show they will leave the theater with an open heart, togetherness, and happiness.”

Before Maya Arulpragasam became the genre-bending rapper M.I.A., she dreamed of being a documentary filmmaker and hoped to chronicle narratives she rarely saw, like those of her family, Tamil people, and other marginalized communities.

Now, viewers can get a glimpse of that world with new documentary Matangi/Maya/M.I.A. by director Stephen Loveridge, which premieres at the Parkway Theatre on Friday, October 19. The film offers new insights about the life, trials, and activism of an artist whose sound ruled the early 2000s.

In the film, we learn that her father was a Sri Lankan revolutionary, a founding member in the Tamil Resistance Movement, a collective who fought against the genocide of the Tamil people. In 1995, when Maya was 10 years old, she and her family were forced to flee Sri Lanka, and emigrate to an immigrant ghetto in Britain. While there, Maya was exposed to struggles of other peoples and found a particular connection to the African-American experience through hip-hop and by reading anti-colonial literature from scholars like Frantz Fanon.

One of the highlights of the documentary is its inclusion of behind the scene footage of M.I.A. traveling around the world to gather sounds for her second album, Kala. In an effort to produce a truly global sound, M.I.A. worked with musicians in Sri Lanka, Trinidad, Jamaica, Central Africa and Black America, with significant time spent in Baltimore. One thing that always drew me to the soundscapes M.I.A. produced on Kala was the bass and meter it sourced from Baltimore Club. It is no surprise that Philadelphia-bred producer Diplo was highly influenced by Baltimore Club and reached out to legendary Baltimore-based producer Blaqstarr to work on cuts for M.I.A.’s second album, Kala. Tracks written and produced by Blaqstarr include “The Turn” and “World Town,” which incorporated elements from Blaqstarr’s classic banger, “Hands Up Thumbs Down.”

Music aside, the film’s recurrent theme is that of conflict—M.I.A.’s struggle to find balance between the privilege and ambivalence of celebrity, and her self-imposed responsibility to, like her father, use her platform as a vehicle to address devastating civil injustices in Sri Lanka. Family photographs, found footage, and documentary video shot by Maya, intercut with more recent footage by Loveridge, a longtime friend and early art school classmate, reveal the artist’s eminent failure to leverage her celebrity for the freedom of Tamil people and also maintain her celebrity.

Every culture has a caste system, an “othered” population that usually has a darker complexion, follows a religious system other than Christianity or a belief that is outside of the Abrahamic religious structure, or is a different ethnic group or class than the nations ruling class. The documentary reveals that, despite these global inequities, people, especially those from so-called first world nations, quickly forget that we are implicated by our avoidance to combat systemic inequalities.

In 2010, around the release of Maya, an album notoriously reviled for its visceral music video “Born Free,” which depicted the violence of genocide by using white, red-haired victims in place of people of color, M.I.A. went on a media tour to call out the Sri Lankan governments participation in the genocide of Tamil people. The response was anything but favorable. Major media outlets including The New York Times and The Guardian, among others, quickly mocked and discredited her motives. In many ways Matangi/Maya/M.I.A. seems to try to shift the narrative away from that gas lighting, and the perception that M.I.A. was merely an airheaded, unintellectual persona, towards a more realized and historically nuanced reflection, in the artist’s own words, about her journey to become M.I.A. and her persistent support for the freedom and protection of Tamil people.

The documentary is a slow burn that leaves a lasting impression about how quickly one’s politics can make them fall out of favor with popular culture.

This year marks the 200th anniversary of the birth of Frederick Douglass, a pioneer whose tireless efforts to abolish American chattel slavery and demand equal voting rights for women and black men laid the foundation for longstanding legislative reforms. Douglass, a renowned orator, abolitionist and author was born a slave in Talbot County Maryland in 1818. Though the exact date of his birth remains unknown, Douglass adopted February 14 as his birthday.

On Thursday, October 18, the Frederick Douglass-Isaac Myers Maritime Museum will celebrate the opening of Frederick Douglass Bicentennial, an intimate art exhibition that honors his life and legacy. Curated by Kibibi Ajanku, the exhibition features a broad selection of imaginative portraits rendered by accomplished illustrator Ed Towles.

“[Douglass] walked the streets of Baltimore and did light-hearted things with a serious intent,” Ajanku noted. “I wanted to speak to that and was looking for an opportunity to celebrate his bicentennial through the art of an African-American artist who also has some legacy and connection to the city.”

Frederick Douglass Bicentennial prominently exhibits revised portraits of Douglass from key moments in his personal life and career with an aesthetic that highlights Towles’ broad design expertise: illustration, letterpress, offset poster, digital print, linoleum cut print, typography, and ceramic tile painting. The Pennsylvania-born, Baltimore-based artist emphasizes the artisanship of printmaking and what he calls “ad-libbing illustration” to realize rarely seen portrayals of black icons like Douglass, his family, and abolitionist allies.

“Part of the process is around self-exploration,” Towles shared. “I am a designer. I have to keep working at my craft and exploring. Sometimes a show forces your hand. [Douglass] was an early subject for me. I did a print in 1975. As a black man, he represented what we should be or strive towards. Harriet Tubman was a major influence, too. Their efforts were the same in trying to liberate black folks.”

By highlighting lesser known moments in Douglass’ life, Towles transcends familiar representations of Douglass as a stoic, solitary figure. In Lincoln and Douglass (2018), a digital print, Towles superimposes an image of the white house overtop red and blue stylized pop art portraits of President Abraham Lincoln and Douglass to depict their 1864 discussion to abolish slavery. Planting the Seeds of Freedom (2018), a large colored pencil portrait, features an interesting three-quarter image of a young Douglass lost in thought. Scenes of his harrowing escape from slavery emerge from his recognizable afro. In another portrait, Anna Murray Douglass and Family, (2018) Towles renders a distinguished likeness of Douglass’ wife and extended family in colored pencil.

Towles has extensive experience working as a professional designer for major publications including Black Enterprise, EBONY, Record World, and the now-defunct Crisis Magazine, as well as collaborating with prominent contemporary artists like Romare Bearden.

“There is a thread to the work that underlies all these themes,” Towles said. “Social issues [have] always been a part of the work. I wanted to imagine Frederick Douglass in a different way. His history is so profound you can’t cover it all in 20 pieces.”

The Afro Punk Ballet, an Afro-futurist opera written by composer Scott Patterson and Eric T. Styles and choreographer Preston Andrew Patterson, imagines a post-apocalyptic future where the lush blue green of our world is scorched dusty red by the heat of two suns. “There used to be a river here” General Levi (played by Jarrod Lee) bellows with lament over the devastation wreaked by his greatest invention, the creation of a second sun. His miraculous discovery threatens to destroy all life in the galaxy. What compels a man to generate a second sun? His daughters Corfazsia (Jocelyn Hunt) and Jakub (Alicia Wiliams) are charged to answer that question. We, the audience, watch to see if the world will collapse before they can.

Produced by Afro House, the production is described as “an exploration of the crossroads between African spirituality, mathematics, and physics” and it’s set in an indistinct universe sometime in the distant future. The hypnotizing coo of mezzo-soprano Spirit/Legba (Elise Jenkins) pierces the eerie still of the intimate Peale Center. Her face and those of the other chorus members is obscured by intricate laser printed helmets designed by A.W. Nadine Grant. Scott Patterson plays melodic riffs on his red Fender Rhodes from the center of the room.

The soundscapes evoke the familiar ethereal resonance and pulsing punk accents of sci-fi classics like Blade Runner or Fantastic Planet, but also cull from black musical traditions like gospel, blues, jazz, Afrobeat, and hip hop to illuminate the environments of this new world. If Herbie Hancock and Daft Punk had an interstellar love child that was raised on the avant-garde compositions of Sun Ra, the child would create music that sounds something like this, an otherworldly groove that is operatic but also deeply soulful.

Each of Patterson’s intonations are echoed and accentuated with gush worthy choral accompaniments. Spoiler alert: everybody can sang! Their soaring arias describe the woeful destruction of the second sun and humanities imminent demise. Jakub, the youngest daughter of General Levi, leaps and sprints around the scene. Each pirouette channels celestial orbits, or portals that open passageways to future nows and yesteryears. Her movements are a significant feature of her developing powers, gifts that are slowly revealed in Act 1. Her eldest sister, Corfazsia, a military prodigy readies her army for a war that is rumored to be encroaching on their families territory. With a running time of roughly 50 minutes, Act 1 lays the foundation for a dynamic Afro-futurist tale like nothing that you have ever experienced before.

We spoke with the Patterson brothers during a dress rehearsal of the first act of The Afro Punk Ballet about their inspiration, creative process, and why they chose this medium.

The Afro Punk Ballet is currently in development. How far are you from showcasing the full production?
Scott Patterson: We have had the concept for this for about 4 or 5 years and talked about the idea of a piece called Afro Punk Ballet, inspired by the Afropunk movement, not just the festival.

Preston made the point yesterday that, “We are all fighting for a piece of ourselves in the story.” I think our story reflects that. This summer we had a residency at Single Carrot Theatre for a week to work on a preview of a preview. After that preview [we] decided to concentrate on Act 1. We are really trying to build a universe, not just create a new world, but a new solar system, way of being, [and] that takes time.

Preston Patterson: We wanted the freedom to create as much as we could. We have been playing around with the idea that this is not earth, our solar system or our time. What we are attempting is to take who we are and put that in another time and space. This is an experiment.

Why did you choose opera as the medium to tell this narrative?
SP: Lots of reasons. I love the way opera is big and able to be big. I felt like that is one thing I feel is missing from a lot of Black narratives in all mediums. I’ve been wanting to see Black people in epic bigness. The cast is currently nine people. I envision the cast becoming 45-50 people. [This] one story is going to spawn dozens of other stories. I wanted to give a genesis.

That means it has to be a really big concept and I feel that opera was one way to tackle that. I wanted to see black opera singers in roles that liberate them and place them as more than marginal characters. We wanted to write stories that we thought were dope.

The Sara Spencer Washington Story, a short documentary from Baltimore-raised, New York-based filmmaker Royston Scott, is one of nearly 100 films from 16 countries screening this week at the Fifth Annual Baltimore International Black Film Festival. Scott offers a compelling glimpse into the vast accomplishments of his grandmother, Sara Spencer Washington, one of the first African-American millionaires.

In 1920, Sara Spencer Washington, notably recognized as “The Madame,” founded Apex News and Hair Company, a black-owned-and-operated beauty brand empire. Apex capitalized on the absurdity of American segregation by targeting consumers white beauty brands refused to acknowledge. Apex advertisements centered around black aesthetics and showcased the style and humanity of African-American culture.

Washington was able to increase the wealth and prestige of Apex across the eastern seaboard while innumerable businesses collapsed during the Great Depression. Those earnings allowed for an ambitious expansion of the Apex brand. In less than a decade, she brokered many lucrative endeavors: Apex Beauty Colleges, beachfront resort Hotel Brigantine, Apex Country Course in Atlantic City, and various philanthropic initiatives. Celebrities of the era like Joe Lewis and Marian Anderson regularly graced the cover of Apex News. By the mid-1950s, the brand had employed and educated thousands of African Americans.

We spoke briefly with director Royston Scott about the incredible and inspiring story of Sara Spencer Washington and The Apex News and Hair Company.

This is a powerful documentary. What inspired you to tell her story?
When my mother passed away, I found in the basement all of these boxes of Apex memorabilia and scrap books. My mother had compiled scrapbooks of newspaper articles, and clippings of graduates in their caps and gowns, hundreds of Black women in caps and gowns from the 1930s and 40s. One whole book was D.C., another Baltimore, another Atlanta, Atlantic City. I realized if all these women graduated in this year, and all of the scrapbooks were by year, I was trying to figure out how many women had actually graduated and how many lives were affected.

What struck you about this particular story?

I really had a moment that brought me to tears realizing that my family history was so important and influential in affecting the lives of so many black women. This story is really important. I dug deeper into the boxes and found magazine that had promotional items and equipment that you could use in salons. I realized the magnitude of the business, which is something I never looked into as a kid.

And why turn this story into a documentary?

It’s something I looked into when I went to study at NYU to go to film school and acting. I thought it would be a great project. This is my first documentary. It’s definitely been a labor of love. My mother’s health took a turn for the worst right before I was about to interview her. Within a year she passed away. I lost with her passing firsthand knowledge of Apex and growing up with Sara Spencer Washington. She grew up as the Apex heiress, debutant and the face of Apex after The Madame passed away in 1953. It was a life-changing event for me. I realized my family’s history was so important and I realized I had the opportunity to do something about it as a filmmaker and documentary filmmaker.

What has it been like to see your work come to fruition?

Things are really going great and this has been such a rewarding experience. My colleague Jacob Burckhardt, who is the assistant producer, [has been] instrumental in helping me along with this. It took seven years to make this. It’s been a great learning experience all around. I know it means a lot to the people who see it. I really want the youth of today to know about their role models. That’s the great thing about making documentary films—you learn about role models and your history. I believe that people should be aware of their history.

The Sara Spencer Washington Documentary will screen this Thursday, October 4, at 12:30 p.m. at The Charles Theatre.