Light plays a role in how safe people feel—and actually are—in any major city. Throughout Baltimore’s Station North Arts & Entertainment District, Inviting Light—a series of activations supported by Bloomberg Philanthropies’ Public Art Challenge and curated by renowned artist and Baltimore native Derrick Adams—is meant to explore the connection between art, light, and design, all while enhancing the neighborhood’s vibrancy and walkability after dark.
Since February, Inviting Light has unveiled Zoë Charlton’s “security nightlight” sculpture “Third Watch” at North Avenue Market; transformed the parking garage across from the Charles Theatre with Phaan Howng’s colorful “Big Ass Snake (Plant)s on a Plane” design (an ode to action movies); and illuminated the facade of the old Gatsby’s on Charles with Tony Shore’s neon wonder “Aurora.”
The newest installation, the fourth of five site-specific temporary public artworks in the series, is “Soft Gym,” created by Baltimore-based artist duo Daniel Wickerham and Malcolm Lomax, known collectively as Wickerham & Lomax.
For this work, which takes over the site of the new YNot Lot at 101 W. North Ave., they collaborated with local architecture firm Present Company and design-fabrication studio Paradise Labs to use light, space, and metaphor to bring their very first public artwork to life.
At an official debut last week, more than 100 visitors were the first to connect with the transformed community lot, described as equal parts playground, art exhibit, and social experiment.
Located at the site of a former bank building in the heart of the arts district, the outdoor gathering place now boasts illuminated mixed-media works, a gym rig, marble benches, padded walls, and a redesigned stage. Take a closer look and you’ll discover details that tell their own stories, like traffic mirrors meant to inspire reflection, squeegees transformed into Olympic torches, glowing bagged-ice sconces inspired by Edgar Degas’ “Little Dancer” (as seen at the BMA), a facade that mimics that of a local bar, The Drinkery, and colorful stools crafted out of weight plates dotted with chewing gum.
“We were thinking about how the physical becomes visual, and how image becomes touch again,” Wickerham said in an description of the installation. “Gum on stools, sweat printed on light boxes, embedded graffiti.”
As its name signifies, “Soft Gym” isn’t a gym in a traditional sense, rather, a place to work out our shared experiences or have moments of personal emotional reflection. As Lomax described in a video introduction to the work, it mimics the vulnerability of going into a gym, where eyes follow as you exercise. Here, that vulnerability is still present, but as people use the space for “quiet contemplative activities,” like stretching, resting, or viewing the art.
As the artists put it, they want the exhibit to promote vulnerability and “infect the bloodstream of the city through gesture.”
“I think of how healing and vulnerability are usually [seen] as a cycle that gets completed. But, of course, it’s an ongoing process,” Wickerham tells us. “I like the idea of folding in other people. It’s not about perfecting yourself. It’s kind of about learning to live the best life you can, knowing that you’re in relationship with one another.”
Adds Lomax: “You’re always in that state of becoming, you’re always in that state of healing. You don’t know what circumstances will come up to cause grief,” he says. “Let’s identify and witness each other doing that…let’s say certain things without having judgment cloud it.”
Historically, the YNot Lot—stationed at the corner of Charles Street and North Avenue from 2014-2022—has been known to foster this kind of community inclusivity, be it through performances, festivals, food drives, or candlelight vigils. Station North Arts District director Abby Becker, whose work in the neighborhood started at the original YNot Lot, says the venue has always been a democratic space for people to try new things.
“My favorite thing about the space was that so many people felt like it was theirs,” Becker says. “It’s rare for a sense of belonging to be shared by so many kinds of people.” As for the future, “I can’t wait to see what is going to happen here,” she says, mentioning further workshops, performances, and community resources.
Aligning with the overall civic mission of Inviting Light, the hope is that “Soft Gym,”—expected to remain installed for the next three to five years—will increase community appreciation and public engagement in Station North.
“When artists, community partners, external partners, and the city come together, we don’t just activate a space, we create places where people connect, feel proud, and see their community in a new light,” said Linzy Jackson III, the newly appointed Director for the Mayor’s Office of Art, Culture, and Entertainment, who in his remarks at the unveiling offered thanks to an array of partners like Bloomberg and BGE, as well as project lead Catherine Borg and project co-curator José Ruiz. “Projects like this are helping us strengthen neighborhood identity, bring people closer, and push Baltimore’s creative story forward, block by block and chapter by chapter.”
The activation serves as a reminder that light not only illuminates our surroundings, but also invites us as the audience to feel deeply.
“If you make something with incredible care, maybe it makes the viewer behave differently, or maybe it feels like you’ve cared for the viewer,” says Lomax. “There’s a lot of stress out here on the streets…and I was hoping that this could…just make people feel better.”