Born in part from the climate-change protests at museums here and abroad, the Baltimore Museum of Art launched an ambitious collection of environmentally driven initiatives in 2024. Taking its title, Turn Again to the Earth, from the writing of environmental activist Rachel Carson, the ongoing series finds it themes in “the realities and repercussions of climate change [that] have become part of our daily discourse and experiences,” as BMA director Asma Naeem explained in announcing the effort.

Among the highlights to date was The New York Times-acclaimed Black Earth Rising exhibition, guest curated by London-born writer Ekow Eshun, which explored the relationship between race, colonialism, and the climate crisis.

Opening recently and running through early 2026 are three new exhibitions that are a part of the Turn Again to the Earth series— “Deconstructing Nature: Environmental Transformation in the Lucas Collection,” “Engaging the Elements: Poetry in Nature,” and “The Way of Nature: Art from Japan, China, and Korea.”

As Carson writes in her titular work: “In these troubled times it is a wholesome and necessary thing for us to turn again to the earth and in the contemplation of her beauties to know the sense of wonder and humility.”

We recently caught up with BMA chief curator Kevin Tervala to explore the series’ highlights and its overall mission.

One thing I’ve come to appreciate over the past year is the challenging nature of these exhibitions—and the realization that art can be beautiful, powerful, and disconcerting at the same time.
There is an experience [of art] that is just beauty. There is so much depth in Matisse when we look for it, but his work is also pleasing to the eye. Beautiful colors. A great sense of composition. You may find his work rich and beautiful and stunning, but his paintings are not meant to make you a bit “scared,” which is what [you’re talking about].

There is this concept art historians talk about regarding landscape and nature representations called “the sublime,” which is that feeling you get when you stand on the edge of the Grand Canyon, and it’s beautiful, it’s awe-inspiring, and it’s a little terrifying.

That’s a perfect description of the wheatfield burn photograph (above) by Larry Schwarm in the “Engaging the Elements: Poetry in Nature” exhibition.
I think that photo is so alluring precisely because it hits that right note of beauty and terror at the same time.

Somewhat similarly, I like Richard Misrach’s stunning, all-blue image of California’s strange Salton Sea, which went from resort area to health hazard to ghost town. What is one of your highlights?
I love the pairing of contemporary artist Stacy Lynn Waddell, whose work we acquired for the collection, and an artist’s work who inspired her, Winslow Homer. They’re both depicting, separated by a century, the after-effect of a hurricane. This beautiful watercolor from Homer is showing the brilliance you get after a storm goes through, the sun is shining. But there’s destruction. She’s thinking about the perspective of enslaved folks living in the Caribbean during this time, the impact of the hurricane [on their lives], and the transformation of the land. They’re thinking about the same things and depicting them in very different ways.

On a different note, the renderings of the Seine River and River Thames at the start of 19th-century industrialization in the accompanying “Deconstructing Nature” show are timely. Those long-polluted waterways are now being reclaimed and made possible for swimming.
In every chart about pollution or the Industrial Revolution, you have a line on a graph that’s hovering toward the bottom and then, at the late part of the 19th century, spikes up. So do urban populations. It’s the rise of cities. It’s a pivotal moment in European history, in world history, and artists are capturing that.

Let’s discuss the third, new show, “The Way of Nature: Art from Japan, China, and Korea.” It’s a centuries-spanning exhibition of ceramics, textiles, wood-cuts, watercolors—even large-scale photographs—but everything seems to communicate an intrinsically human, one might say spiritual, connection to the earth.
The intro text for the exhibition starts, if I’m remembering correctly, with a quote from a 4th-century landscape painter from China who is saying, to understand and to depict the natural world, you must fuse your mind into it. You must become one with the landscape you’re representing.

It’s what we wanted to do with this exhibition. We wanted to showcase other alternatives, ways of being [in the world]. The society we live in right now, it doesn’t have to be the world we live in, in the future. You can imagine new possibilities or you can look elsewhere and see how other places and other people have done it.

Sandtown-born Joyce Scott learned quilting from her mother, Elizabeth Talford Scott, who learned it from her mother, on the South Carolina plantation where she grew up among a family of sharecroppers. Both went on to acclaimed careers as mixed-media fiber artists, though Joyce, named a 2016 MacArthur Fellow and 2019 Smithsonian Visionary Artist, became more renown for her figurative statues, her jewelry, bead, and glasswork—and, in Baltimore, the massive Memorial Pool installation at Druid Hill Park, which honors the park’s historic segregated swimming pool.

In 2018, the ever-evolving Scott created a towering 15-foot sculpture of Harriet Tubman with a mixture of soil, clay, and straw that was designed to disintegrate into the land near where Tubman led enslaved people to freedom.

With all this and more in mind, the Baltimore Museum of Art presents a 50-year career retrospective of one of the country’s most important working artists today. “Joyce J. Scott: Walk a Mile in My Dreams” opens as a special ticketed exhibition March 24 and runs through July 14 before moving to the Seattle Art Museum.

I recently saw the BMA’s exhibition of your late mother’s work, which will run concurrently with yours through April. The combination builds on your joint 2019 BMA show: “Hitching Dreams to Untamed Stars.”
My mother was born in 1916 and saw amazing change in the world. I lived with her until she passed away [in 2011]. I went to graduate school and traveled and those things, but we were very close. We had that through line of the visual and performing arts, which gave us something to relate to, to talk about, and to build on. For some people, it’s cooking, but for us, art was our conspiracy and our invitation to others. Because once we make it, we share it.

The BMA tells us you’re creating a site-specific installation at the entrance of the retrospective. A small house?
I don’t know what drove this, except I was thinking of a sweat lodge or a gathering space where people would commune in the everyday sense, but also maybe spiritually. It’s a huge four-sided building—picture a yurt—that has quilts on the outside. One in each panel of my mother, grandfather, grandmother, and godmother. The inside is turned out with beaded pieces I did…There’s also a figure who is holding a needle and reaching out with the thread, which represents where I came from and the way that I give as an artist and teacher. And there’s a chair covered in books and tchotchkes from my life that have influenced me.

And you and others may appear inside the “yurt,” greeting people and performing?
Yes, it’s a place where I can sit or, if a storyteller or musician comes in, they can sit and commune with visitors. Sometimes I’m going to come and just sit and talk trash until they throw me out. The guards are already giving me the stink eye.

That’s funny. Can I ask about the nature and themes of your work? How craft or folk art blends with so-called high art or fine art? There are quilts, figurative statues—which are intricately done—jewelry, clothes, dolls. But the titles, “Strange Fruit,” “None Are Free Until All Are Free,” “Lynching Necklace,” make you look twice and reflect on what at first glance may not be obvious.
I’m an artist-craftsperson. I don’t separate them. I’m always doing both. It’s the same impulse, the same creative feeling or setting that makes me make a cup and makes me make a piece of sculpture. There’s not a hierarchy that I ascribe to. I’ve always liked figures and my mom was a doll-maker, too. The work must be created wonderfully, not always beautifully, just wonderfully, so that the person is mesmerized by it. Then they realize, that’s a lynching, or that person is shooting a gun.

You’ve traveled to Africa, Europe, Asia, South America, mixing these diverse influences into different mediums. At the same time, it all remains, intrinsically, your art.
That’s it. I don’t want to be a one-trick pony. I don’t want to be a pony at all…My best voice for communication is as an artist and those influences [and mediums] represent different approaches to art and life that hopefully make me a better person, a more well-rounded, approachable, knowledgeable person. I can’t say it’s enough that I’m alive, that I should eat good food, look good. I think I’m supposed to be on this quest. I feel I am supposed to make this world better for others in whatever way I can.

I was seven years old, standing by the cash register at the National Air and Space Museum in Washington, D.C., with three dollars wadded in my hand, free to choose anything I wanted from the gift shop. My sights were set on the space ice cream—the obvious choice of any red-blooded child of the 1980s. A Neapolitan wafer of Styrofoam-like sugar, it was the next best thing to bouncing weightlessly around the moon’s potholes.

This was no mere souvenir. Instead, my crinkly package of freeze-dried dessert was a tangible thread connecting my little-kid body to the superheroes who ascended into the stars. And from that instant, it was official: I was hooked. Not on the space ice cream—it’s pretty disappointing, actually—but on the magic of the museum gift shop.

Of course, these abound in Baltimore, a city of world-class museums that run the gamut from industrial history to postmodern art. And inside each one, the gift shop is another curated collection, tailored to reflect the people, objects, and stories that make that museum special.

Some are cool. Some are whimsical. Some are surprising. All of them distill the contents of their collections to human size, offering a little bit of the extraordinary to fit into our everyday lives. Their curios let you take some of that wonder home with you, as well as, often enough, the vibrancy, diversity, and unmistakable je ne sais quoi of Baltimore.

Every time I’m in town, I make sure to stop into at least one. A trip to the museum just isn’t complete without them.

American Visionary Art Museum

The G.O.A.T. of Baltimore museum shops is without a doubt Sideshow at the American Visionary Art Museum in Federal Hill. Owned by renegade retailer Ted Frankel, aka “Uncle Fun,” Sideshow is one-part outsider art gallery and one-part tchotchke dreamscape.

Local filmmaker John Waters describes it as “the best museum gift shop you’ve ever been to in your life,” and clearly the man knows what he is talking about. A funky riot of color, objects, books, clothing, antiques, and crafts, each surface and cupboard is bursting with everything you never knew you needed, be it for gag gifts, artsy gifts, kids’ stuff, grown-up stuff, and even stuff for your own home.

There’s a working Zoltar machine, hundreds of novelty sunglasses in the most improbable shapes and colors, whoopee cushions and miniature naked baby dolls, carved coconut monkeys and a stuffed tiger the size of a loveseat. You can spend hours opening tiny drawers full of glass eyeballs or perusing the world’s most robust supply of trick buzzers, squirt cameras, and fart powders.

But the true heart of Sideshow—and where it most closely reflects AVAM’s philosophy of joyful self-expression—is found in the rotating exhibits of artworks by contributing artists from across the country.

It was in this section that I found my favorite museum shop find of all time, a Christmas tree angel crafted from a National Bohemian beer can. To me, that little topper encompasses the spirit of AVAM’s Sideshow—a celebration of the wonder, whimsy, and imagination of those who are called to create. And how Baltimore is that?

Baltimore Museum of Art

Think of it as the Metropolitan Museum of Art—in miniature. The BMA’s collections include 97,000 works that span the art of ancient Egypt to some of the most significant works of modern-day.

The breadth is the point. By developing, maintaining, and now broadening a deep, global collection of the best 18th-, 19th-, and, increasingly, 20th- and 21st-century art and making it accessible to the public, the BMA continues to cultivate a vibrant and healthy city. After an hour or two of edification in the museum’s collections, with the help of free admission, I cultivate my civic duty with a stop in the BMA’s expansive gift shop.

Snag some Cone Collection-inspired journals, prints, and notecards, and don’t sleep on the shop’s jewelry section, which bypasses “statement” and goes right to “declaration.” Collars of acid-treated brass, necklaces of blown-glass globes, and geometrical wire bracelets mirror the Calders in the sculpture garden and Matisse paintings in the galleries.

The shop transforms with each changing exhibition (this past summer’s The Culture hip-hop show had an epic selection), so check out the latest and plan your shopping list accordingly.

I always come prepared to be enchanted and am never disappointed, with my best BMA purchases being a pair of ever-chic punched gold earrings with tiny metallic rays and a postcard of Vincent van Gogh’s painting of hobnailed boots. Pinned above my desk, the latter transports me in an instant to the cool, quiet beauty of the museum’s halls.

Baltimore Museum of Industry

“Industrial chic” is a recent trend, but at the BMI in Locust Point, it was always in style. Their exhibits feel like a Barry Levinson film set come to life—I love to wander through recreated historic shopfronts, printing presses, and workrooms under the glow of neon signs from bygone businesses, traveling back in time each time I turn a corner.

And the museum shop celebrates the city’s long tradition of manufacturing, too, with merch featuring the likeness of the neighboring Domino Sugars sign and books detailing the story of Baltimore’s packing houses, steel mills, and umbrella factories.

The mission of the museum especially shines through in their “Made in Baltimore” section, where you can buy one-of-a-kind treasures crafted on-site. Definitely check out the wonderful handmade iron keychains of beech leaves made by volunteer blacksmith Bob Webber on the BMI’s own working forge. A lifelike little leaf hangs from my key fob, a reminder that I need to plan my annual BMI pilgrimage for 2024.

The BMI also hosts entrepreneur pop-up events throughout the year, where you can support local small businesses and artisans selling prints, crafts, food, artwork, and other goods, including the seasonal farmers market that takes place in its parking lot come spring.

Maryland Center for History and Culture

Who needs reproductions when you can get the real thing? It makes perfect sense that a museum shop celebrating Maryland’s history and culture would sell antiques and vintage clothing on consignment, which has my name all over it.

Just a few steps from the displays of Orioles team cleats and the New Look sportswear of Frederick fashion designer Claire McCardell, you can find your own Maryland treasures at the MCHC. Snap up period finds like chased copper julep cups from the glitzy brownstones of Mount Vernon or fabulous hats from the Hutzler’s department store.

The museum’s changing exhibits, like the recent retrospective on one-time Marylander Jim Henson, also infuse the shop with all sorts of unique state-centric goodies impossible to find anywhere else.

A few years ago, I picked up a jaunty straw clutch from the 1950s, imagining it tucked under the arm of some well-to-do lady taking in a few races at Pimlico. I carry it around in the summertime to channel a little bit of Baltimore’s post-war glamour. And I often think that would make the MCHC proud.

Reginald F. Lewis Museum

Long before there was the Smithsonian’s world-renowned National Museum of African American History & Culture in Washington, D.C., there was the Reginald F. Lewis Museum, located at a cultural crossroads on the edge of historic Jonestown in downtown Baltimore.

The Lewis Museum features more than 400 years of Black Maryland history in its halls and, over the years, has highlighted both the past and present, such as midcentury painter Ruth Starr Rose, who documented Black life on the Eastern Shore to modern-day photographer and West Baltimorean Devin Allen, whose images have graced the cover of Time magazine.

This same sort of expansive oeuvre is on display in the museum’s gift shop, which offers one-of-a-kind ways to celebrate the icons and imagery of Maryland’s Black history. Frederick Douglass merch and original prints, jewelry, and artwork made by local artists of color, as well as children’s books introducing little readers to Maryland’s iconic Black musicians, artists, athletes, and visionaries, are all great reasons to take advantage of the always-free shop admissions. Inventory rotates weekly, so it’s worth popping in on a semi-regular basis. And while you’re there, be sure to stop a while and watch the city go by through its grand floor-to-ceiling windows along President Street.

The Walters Art Museum

The Walters has roots in a core collection of art and artifacts bequeathed to the City of Baltimore in 1934 by its namesake scion, Henry Walters.

Spanning seven millennia of art from around the world, much of the collections are personal in nature, providing glimpses of what museums looked like in the 19th century, when private salon-style exhibits blended artistic techniques and periods to suit individual tastes. The vast Classical and Egyptian galleries in particular make me feel like Claudia in From the Mixed-Up Files of Mrs. Basil E. Frankweiler, with covetable Roman torcs and impassive sphinx figurines.

Fortunately, the gift shop provides the perfect place to scratch that same itch. Replicas of ancient Egyptian, Roman, Greek, Chinese, and Pre-Columbian earrings, cuff links, and pins in gold and silver are shockingly modern in their simplicity and design.

The paper and prints section echoes the global scope of the main collections, with illuminated Ethiopian holiday cards, Renaissance landscape prints, and notecards with delicate Japanese watercolors.

My personal favorites are the replica blueprints of the iconic Walters Museum building itself—the perfect insider gift for the Baltimorean who has everything.

Small But Mighty

Many of Baltimore’s smaller institutions boast their own wildly cool shops with mission-inspired inventories that are delightful to explore.

The B&O Railroad Museum, for instance, has gifts for locomotive lovers of all ages, from striped engineer caps and model train kits to 19th-century replica railway maps and vintage Rails Across America comic books.

At the Edgar Allan Poe House & Museum, snap up Poe “Death Week” vigil candles, “Nevermore” highschool iron-on patches, and International Poe Fest swag.

At The National Great Blacks in Wax Museum, find books, clothing, and souvenirs highlighting notable African Americans, like Baltimore’s own Billie Holiday.

And the T-shirt game at the Babe Ruth Birthplace and Museum is on point, featuring an homage to the baseball icon’s original period uniform and a “Call It” top commemorating the Babe’s epic prediction of his own home run hit to deep center field in 1932, both of which will leave baseball fans with plenty of ways to rep their native son.

Meanwhile, you can find chemistry kits and glow-in-the-dark skeletons at the Maryland Science Center, stuffed animals and shark-tooth necklaces at the National Aquarium, and all sorts of books, games, and puzzles at Port Discovery’s brand-new, minority-owned Snug Books.

Imagine walking inside an art museum to find men spitting chew tobacco on the floor, friends calling to one another across galleries, people singing, dogs barking, rowdy teenagers, and mothers soothing crying babies.

Though it might be hard to believe today, if the year were 1860 or thereabouts, this scene would be fairly typical.

But, with the rise of technology—and its subsequent noise (think telegraphs, typewriters, phonographs, sewing machines, and so on)—came the regulation of sound in public spaces like museums, as Asma Naeem asserts in her dissertation turned 2020 book, Out of Earshot.

“[Museum officials] were in effect encouraging aural behaviors associated with ‘cultured’ persons and discouraging those associated with the ‘lower’ classes,” writes Naeem, the Baltimore Museum of Art’s former chief curator, who was announced as its new director in January.

Today’s museums, like the BMA, are more like libraries or houses of worship, where the only sounds you might hear are hushed voices or quiet heels against empty halls and tiled floors. It gives museums a rarefied, impersonal air that does not truly reflect the art inside.

“I always think of art as having this aural component or a soundtrack,” says Naeem, “and I always thought museums were missing that.”

Only amplifying the silence in 2023 is the fact that, for the past two decades, museum attendance has been steadily declining across the United States. And while this downtrend is likely due in part to people finding entertainment through the internet (with an assist from the COVID-19 pandemic), museums have increasingly received criticism in recent years for their pretension, irrelevance, and gatekeeping that do not accurately represent America’s diversity of race, gender, class, politics, or ideas.

Throughout her career, Naeem, 53, has been working to dissolve some of those conventions. First, as a curator at the National Portrait Gallery, where she diversified the D.C. institution’s collection by featuring portraits of rappers, including one of late Baltimorean Tupac Shakur, which brought new dialogues and audiences to the space. And, more recently, at the BMA, where she has continued that effort by examining the. historical context of the museum and its collections while championing underrepresented artists—particularly people of color, women, and local artists, such as late Baltimore-based printmaker and sculptor Valerie Maynard, whose work Naeem co-curated for the artist’s first major museum exhibition in 2020.

In 2018, just before Naeem was hired as chief curator, the BMA deaccessioned seven artworks from its contemporary holdings in order to create space for work by underrepresented artists, i.e., those who were also women, Black, Indigenous, self-trained, or had connections to Baltimore. Over the next three years, the museum acquired 125 works by 85 artists—the majority of whom were represented for the first time in the collection.

Several of these new acquisitions were shown in the 2021 contemporary exhibit, “Now Is The Time,” including work by homegrown artists like Maynard, Jerrell Gibbs, and Theresa Chromati. The show provided the public with a visual account of the curatorial efforts led by Naeem, as well as those by Katy Siegel, former BMA senior programming and research curator, who has since left her post to join the staff at the San Francisco Museum of Modern Art. (Another deaccessioning in 2020 created a bit of a stir in the art world, and the BMA responded by taking the three pieces that were set to be sold, one of which was an Andy Warhol, off the table.)

“I want to build upon the fantastic work that the BMA has done in the past few years and continue to make the museum a space that is welcoming, equitable, dynamic, and engaging for our visitors and for our staff as well,” says Naeem about her vision as director, noting that efforts will be focused on exhibitions and collection practices, as well as programming and partnerships with the likes of schools, universities, arts organizations, and other community members. “It’s in these collaborations that I think we stand to make the greatest positive impact.”

A perfect example is the forthcoming exhibit, “The Culture: Hip Hop and Contemporary Art in the 21st Century,” which will fuse Naeem’s interest in the sound—or the lack thereof—of the art world with her passion for making it more inclusive. Co-curated by Naeem and on view at the BMA from April 5 to July 16 before moving to the St. Louis Art Museum (SLAM) for the remainder of 2023, the show comes during the 50th anniversary of the dawn of hip-hop and explores the genre’s past 20 years through sound as well as visual art, fashion, and ephemera. It was created in collaboration with BMA chief education officer Gamynne Guillotte, staff at SLAM, and a wide-ranging advisory board featuring creatives from Baltimore and around the world.

“Music is a big part of my life, but I’m not a musician in any sense of the word,” says Naeem, who has been dreaming about this project for several years. “Hip-hop was just an incredibly energizing sound that I started to hear coming from the radio in the ’80s as a teenager. To hear this new way of rapping was amazing. I spent a lot of time listening to the lyrics. And I loved to dance. That’s how I primarily spent my youth: in dance clubs…And what really gravitated me toward this idea for the exhibition was the ways in which, as a cultural phenomenon, hip-hop has seeped into every aspect of our lives and created a powerful visual set of languages that are both obvious and not so obvious everywhere around us.”

“I ALWAYS THINK OF ART AS HAVING THIS AURAL COMPONENT OR A SOUNDTRACK.”

 

In a first for the BMA, the exhibition will include atmospheric soundscapes—not audio through headphones, as museums have embraced for years, but a sonic experience that envelopes visitors as soon as they step foot inside the show, with two recordings created by Baltimore musicians Wendel Patrick and Abdu Ali heard throughout the exhibition space.

“The Culture” will also highlight visual work by local artists such as photographer Devin Allen; filmmakers Nia June, APoetNamedNate, and Kirby Griffin; sculptors Murjoni Merriweather and Joyce J. Scott; and painters Ernest Shaw Jr. and Derrick Adams; plus art-world giants like photographer Carrie Mae Weems, mixed-media artist Mark Bradford, and late painter Jean-Michel Basquiat; as well as pieces by global fashion designers like Vivienne Westwood and Louis Vuitton’s Virgil Abloh. Baltimore-born artist Shinique Smith will also create a commissioned mural near Lexington Market in conjunction with the show. Several other city creatives are included in the exhibition catalog, too, such as musician TT The Artist and cultural critic Lawrence Burney, who founded the local arts publication True Laurels.

At a pivotal time for museums, Naeem’s work is helping to shape and shift the BMA to become a better reflection of current culture. And she feels an exhibit like this will go a long way toward demonstrating that the BMA is serious about serving as a mirror of its community.

The BMA is not unique in its efforts to reexamine its mission statement and implement changes, as museums nationwide have been historically composed of majority-white leadership, boards, and featured artists. Internationally, museums have begun to “confront entrenched economic and racial inequities, and the ways in which those are encoded in museum collections, presentations, staffing and organizational cultures,” wrote museum advisor and journalist András Szántó in The Art Newspaper in 2020. Many are reframing their objectives to redress prior wrongs and ultimately make, says Szántó, “their buildings and campuses more hospitable to everyone.”

The current BMA staff is overwhelmingly made up of women, with people of color and gender-nonconforming people represented as well, ultimately making the museum more reflective of society as a whole. After Christopher Bedford’s departure as director last June, Naeem became interim co-director of the museum, alongside chief operating officer Christine Dietze, before being hired for the top post at the beginning of this year, making her the first person of color to lead the BMA.

On the surface, Naeem’s former life as a criminal prosecutor in New York City might seem at odds with her role as a museum director and curator. But the overlap is her desire to effect positive social change. After burning out on life as an attorney, she pursued a master’s degree in art history at American University in D.C., followed by a PhD in art history from the University of Maryland, College Park, ultimately returning to Baltimore, where she grew up after immigrating to the U.S. from Pakistan as a child.

“Asma is profoundly brilliant as a scholar, has a strong vision as an arts leader, and has tremendous and considerable personal warmth…[a combination] that’s rare to find at this level of work,” says “The Culture” co-curator Guillotte. “She’s not afraid to lead with her emotion because she knows that is part of where her intelligence as a scholar and a thinker and a leader is.”

When planning the exhibition, “it was essential that we include local artists, because hip-hop itself is a set of local histories,” says Naeem. “Baltimore has such an incredibly vibrant history of hip-hop. There’s no way that we could pay homage to this canon without including some of the incredibly talented Baltimoreans.”

And that includes visual artists who capture the spirit of hip-hop in their work. Like sculptor Murjoni Merriweather, for instance—a recent Maryland Institute College of Art graduate and Prince George’s County native turned Baltimore resident, whose sculpture “Z E L L A,” one of about 50 busts that the 27-year-old has created using various mediums, depicts a Black woman whose hair is pulled into a dramatic high ponytail woven entirely out of hair extensions.

“Hip-hop is such a huge part of Black culture, and it’s a fight to normalize who we are as people—what we create, what we wear, who we decide to be—which goes hand in hand with my artwork,” says Merriweather, whose works also often feature hoop earrings and metallic grills. “I don’t want people to see grills and think they’re intimidating or some type of danger. They are just teeth jewelry, at the end of the day. I want people to start thinking like that, instead of putting stereotypes on them and making us seem like less-than.”

To make the exhibit as authentic as possible, Naeem brought together a diverse selection of hip-hop experts to be a part of its advisory board, consisting of individuals across academia, music, fashion, and art, such as Martha Diaz, founder and president of the Hip-Hop Education Center at New York University; Tef Poe, a St. Louis-based rapper and activist; and Brazilian anthropologist and curator of Afro-Atlantic histories, Hélio Menezes.

Locally, Wendel Patrick has helped lead the charge. The Boom Bap Society musician has almost single-handedly brought hip-hop to Peabody Conservatory, where he serves as a professor. Part of his role with the BMA advisory committee, alongside fellow local artist Abdu Ali, was to ensure that hip-hop history was presented with accuracy.

“I’ve been an educator at the university level since 2001, so I’ve observed and absorbed the ways in which institutions tend to think about the dissemination of information,” says Patrick. Since the earliest days of hip-hop, which is said to have been invented on the streets of the Bronx by DJ Kool Herc in 1973, “There’s been a real beauty in the way that people have been able to ingest knowledge [about hip-hop] that hasn’t been in a traditional educational setting, where there is a curriculum where people have decided what is important and, by virtue of that, what isn’t.”

When hip-hop is documented in museums or studied in institutes of higher education, continues Patrick, “It’s important that it be accurate or represented in a way where opinions are representative of people who have been present for a significant period of time.” Which makes this exhibition perfectly timed, with its curatorial intention aligning with the more overarching refreshes and newfound mission of the BMA.

“ASMA IS PROFOUNDLY BRILLIANT AS A SCHOLAR, HAS A STRONG VISION AS AN ARTS LEADER…”

 

The exhibit will also include an archival aspect that goes beyond its comprehensive catalog. Fans and artists will be encouraged to share their experiences by scanning and uploading documents—old ticket stubs or concert fliers, for instance—and telling their own stories, which will appear as an online collection. Items can be scanned either inside the exhibit space or from a phone or computer offsite.

“It was so valuable to have [the idea of] education in the room from the jump, because typically in the way exhibitions come about, education comes into the process once the artworks are decided, the checklist is decided, the floor plan is laid out, and then we come and do the icing on the cake,” says Guillotte. “Asma wanted to bring this in early on in the process.”

Every time the curators got together, their discussions centered around inclusivity and accessibility: Why is this relevant to our visitors? Who is the audience? How will we be engaging with them? What kind of context do they need to be able to understand what we’re presenting? What kinds of barriers do we need to remove to that understanding?

“The Culture” is merely one lens through which to see how the BMA is shifting—in terms of its subject matter, which audiences it’s trying to reach, and whose work is and isn’t included. Last spring, the museum launched the “Guarding the Art” exhibition, envisioned by Naeem and curated by its own security department, and last July, the nearly 140 employees also voted to form a union, becoming Baltimore’s first local institution to do so.

Asked what she thinks the role of an art museum is today, Naeem says, “That’s the million-dollar question that all of us, as stewards of a collection, are trying to work toward, making sure we’re preserving the integrity of our communities around us. What we need to be doing as museum leaders is building a collection of artistic excellence that goes beyond certain cultures and histories that have previously been championed.”

She points to the ways in which, up until the 20th century, women artists did not have access to art schools or artistic materials like oil paints or canvases and would resort to what is known as the decorative arts, a topic which will be discussed in an upcoming exhibit, titled “Making Her Mark.”

“When I think of the ways in which we can tell a far more inclusive story of art-making in our current day, that means interweaving a number of different kinds of art forms,” says Naeem, suggesting incorporating the likes of fashion, and not just couture—but streetwear, too. “If we are going to be including in our permanent collection and displaying 19th-century African jewelry, why can’t we be displaying 21st-century African-American jewelry inspired by hip-hop?”

As curator of American art at the Baltimore Museum of Art, Virginia Anderson is particularly focused on the last few words of its mission statement—to create “a museum welcoming to all,” with a goal of assembling exhibitions that center on the voices and experiences of historically marginalized groups.

One of the keys to that success? Her BMA colleagues.

“There are so many things you have to balance as a curator working with different departments to make the art and the narrative shine,” says Anderson, 51, formerly assistant curator at the Harvard Art Museums. “I’ve experienced collegiality at every museum I’ve worked in, but I think intellectual resourcing is having a moment.”

Comparing notes and research with colleagues across multiple departments allows Anderson to present exhibitions of American art that showcase a more inclusive art history, both in the selection of objects and in the display itself. Since arriving at the BMA, she has curated four exhibitions—two solo shows, with works by female contemporary artists, and two group shows, showcasing art movements, such as women modernists. And each has been created with the help of her first hire—curatorial assistant Sarah Cho, an art history major hired straight out of Princeton University.

The duo’s most recent collaboration is the first time that Cho has fully stepped into the role of co-curator. Three years in the making and up through October 2, Beatrice Glow: Once the Smoke Clears occupies three galleries in the museum’s Contemporary Wing, showcasing cross-disciplinary works by the bicoastal artist-researcher, including the first-ever virtual reality-sculpted and 3D-printed objects exhibited at the BMA. Glow examines histories of Indigenous, Chinese, and Black communities as they relate to the Chesapeake Bay tobacco trade, recasting the white depiction of the region’s history.

Anderson and Cho hope that people will attend the exhibit, read the accompanying wall text, and be inspired to continue learning more about the substance of Glow’s work.

“What Virginia and I wanted to do is spotlight aspects of Beatrice’s research,” says Cho, 26. “One of the major goals of Beatrice’s work is highlighting solidarities between Asia and the Americas.”

Both women are the exhibit’s co-curators—or “thought partners,” as Cho describes them—but they’re quick to point out that Glow’s exhibition would not have been possible without the entire museum staff.

“The museum can function as a kind of lab,” says Anderson. “Just as within the sciences, you have collaboration and research from a team of people that supports a particular project or angle of inquiry…This collaborative approach to research can only benefit our audiences.”

Is your kid’s idea of fun brushing a baby goat? Or do they really dig dinosaurs? Perhaps they prefer practicing kickflips or traversing hiking trails. Whether your child is into Picasso or planets, skipping rocks or riding roller coasters, there is something for every interest, every age, and every family in the Baltimore area.

For Rachel Zillig, a mom of two in Baltimore County, the pandemic had a huge impact on her family’s activities. With libraries, museums, and just about every other kid-friendly place shut down, “We had to seek out other stuff or we’d have gone insane just sitting in the house,” says Zillig, whose Instagram account, @BaltimoreFamilyFun, details their adventures in the area. Now that most places have opened back up, she’s looking forward to visiting old favorites like Port Discovery and the Maryland Zoo in Baltimore, but she’s not giving up the local parks and outdoor activities they enjoyed during COVID-19. “Just walking around the Inner Harbor during the day is a fun activity for my kids. They love looking at the boats.”

If your family has a particular place you love to visit again and again, consider purchasing a membership. The pandemic had a devastating impact on the arts, entertainment, and recreation sector, with nearly 60 percent of museums forced to cut back on education, programming, and other public services, according to Artnet News.

But things are looking up, with plenty of Baltimore regional destinations open and ready to safely do business. Check out our guide to find out what’s happening at new and old family favorites throughout the region this summer.

PORT DISCOVERY CHILDREN’S MUSEUM
35 Market Pl., Baltimore, MD 21202.
Three floors of interactive exhibits and settings for imaginative play will keep toddlers and preschoolers entertained for hours. Kids ages 5-12 can build confidence and motor skills as they scale the multi-story SkyClimber. This always-changing museum is “huge but never seems crowded,” says Zillig, whose family’s favorites include the replica Royal Farms, a delightfully realistic pretend diner, and a water playroom. (Pro tip: bring a change of clothes!)

THE NATIONAL AQUARIUM
501 E Pratt St., Baltimore, MD 21202.
No matter how many times you visit the Aquarium, there’s always something new to see. You could spend an entire day searching for the sloths in the tropical rainforest or being mesmerized by all the different kinds of jellyfish. With more than 20,000 aquatic creatures, an enormous shark tank, and hands-on exhibits, kids will be educated and entertained every time. Note: strollers are not permitted.

MARYLAND SCIENCE CENTER
601 Light St., Baltimore, MD 21230.
Come for the dinosaurs, stay for the interactive science exhibits. Kids can create their own inventions, lie on a bed of nails, learn about the human body, and experience the electromagnetic spectrum through light and prisms. Don’t miss the planetarium, rooftop observatory, and IMAX theater, too.

THE MARYLAND ZOO
1 Safari Pl., Baltimore, MD 21217.
From the perky prairie dogs to the gentle giraffes to the cheeky chimpanzees, this world-class zoo is home to more than 1,500 amazing animals—including the largest African penguin breeding colony in North America. Your wild things can run amok along the shady paved paths and ride the new zero emissions electric shuttles back to the free parking lot when they’re tired.

BALTIMORE MUSEUM OF ART
10 Art Museum Dr., Baltimore, MD 21218.
There’s more to the BMA than the Cone Collection’s Matisses and Monets. Kids who like dollhouses will adore the Cheney Miniatures Gallery, and the museum’s African art collection features 2,500
masks, textiles, and other works from more than 200 cultures. Indoor voices are not required to explore the outdoor sculpture garden. Currently, reservations are required for free admission. Strollers and front baby carriers are permitted in the museum.

LAKE ROLAND PARK & NATURE CENTER
1000 Lakeside Dr., Baltimore, MD, 21210.
The Lake Roland Dam is the focal point of this 500-acre sanctuary in the middle of Baltimore. Popular among pet owners for its fenced-in Paw Point dog park (membership required), Lake Roland features a unique playground, a new nature center, various hiking and biking trails, and a boardwalk from the Falls Road Light Rail station. Stop by Tropicool Italian Ice afterward for a sweet treat.

OREGON RIDGE PARK & NATURE CENTER
13555 Beaver Dam Rd., Cockeysville, MD 21030.
This 1000-plus-acre park is a great place to burn off energy. It features several playgrounds, picnic areas, plenty of trails ranging from easy to challenging, and a quarry where you can skip rocks and watch the ducks. Several animal enclosures house bunnies, geese, chickens and more, and the nature center hosts educational events and storytimes.

LADEW TOPIARY GARDENS
3535 Jarrettsville Pike, Monkton, MD 21111.
Unicorn-shaped shrubs, windows carved into hedges, koi ponds, an enchanting teahouse, butterfly house, and gift shop are just some of the delights you’ll find here, along with 22 acres of space to run wild and enjoy nature. Admission required; children under two are free.

RASH FIELD PARK
300 Key Highway, Baltimore, MD 21230.
Baltimore’s newest park opened last November in the heart of the Inner Harbor. Kids can clamber up a pair of 35-foot wooden towers in the Adventure Park, slip down a giant slide, soar on the swings, dig in the sand pit, or bring their board and drop into the skate park.

THE GO-KART TRACK
10907 Pulaski Hwy., White Marsh, MD 21162.
Feel the need for speed? With three different go-kart tracks, a mini-golf course (half price on weekdays), and all the classic arcade games, there’s something for everyone here. Kids aged 3 and up can join a driver age 16+ on the Family Track, and speed demons at least 52” tall can drop the pedal to the medal on the Drift Track.

SKATEPARK OF BALTIMORE
1121 W 36th St., Baltimore, MD 21211.
Got a budding skateboarder or trick scooter rider? Strap on your pads and helmet and hit this Hampden hotspot. It’s free and open daily from dawn to dusk. If you need some new grip tape, Vu Skate Shop is just around the corner on Falls Road.

EASTERN WATERSPORTS
4001 Bay Dr., 7200 Graces Quarters Rd., and 7400 Graces Quarters Rd., Middle River, MD 21220.
You don’t have to drive to Annapolis or Ocean City to get a taste of salt life. With three locations, two within Gunpowder Falls State Park and two with legitimate sandy beaches, this seasonal shop rents kayaks, stand-up paddleboards, and canoes by the hour. Children under 10 can accompany a parent or guardian on a tandem kayak or paddleboard. Kids 10 and up can rent their own with a renting adult.

SPLASH PADS
Multiple locations.
Looking to cool down and get wet on a hot day, no pool membership required? Baltimore City is home to several splash pads, including at West Shore Park in the Inner Harbor, Mt. Vernon Children’s Park, and The Rotunda. Visit BaltimoreFamilies.org/pools for locations.

BALTIMORE COUNTY PUBLIC LIBRARY “STORYVILLE”
There’s more to the library than storytime. Storyville, located at Baltimore County Public Library’s Rosedale and Woodlawn branches, is a play-and-learn center designed to promote early literacy and school-readiness skills in children ages 0-5. This enchanting child-sized village features books, toys, and activities for tots and their parents or caregivers.

DUTCH WONDERLAND
2249 Lincoln Hwy. E, Lancaster, PA 17602.
This amusement park in Amish country is extremely popular with young families for a reason. The 48-acre layout is accessible, not overwhelming, and the rides are geared toward little kids. Duke’s Lagoon is a water park within the park that’s worth a visit all on its own.

HERSHEYPARK
100 Hersheypark Dr., Hershey, PA 17033.
Thrillseekers throng to this family theme park, created by the famous chocolatier Milton S. Hershey, which features tons of rides, including 15 roller coasters. There are plenty of attractions for the littler set, too. The one-price admission includes all the rides, the water park, and ZooAmerica.

SIX FLAGS AMERICA
13710 Central Ave., Bowie, MD 20721.
Six Flags is home to some of the fastest, tallest, wildest rides in the country, including Firebird, billed as “America’s only floorless roller coaster.” Younger kids can enjoy at least a dozen rides all by themselves. Admission includes access to the Hurricane Harbor waterpark, featuring an 800,000-gallon wave pool and 25 water slides.

KINGS DOMINION
16000 Theme Park Way, Doswell, VA 23047.
Got tweens and teens? Take a three-hour drive to this amusement park near Richmond. Already home to 13 roller coasters, the park will introduce Tumbili, a brand-new, 4D spin coaster, as part of its new-in-2022 immersive Jungle X-pedition. For the little ones, there’s Planet Snoopy. Admission includes access to the Soak City waterpark.

GROWN UP DINING, KID APPROVED

Dining out with kids doesn’t have to be expensive or stressful if you choose one of these family-friendly eateries, offering everything from pizza to medieval feasts.

R. HOUSE
301 W. 29th St., Baltimore, MD 21211.
Food courts and food halls, like this one located in Remington, are great options for dining with kids for a few reasons. First, there’s something for even the pickiest eater. Choose from 10 stalls offering a variety of fare, from pizza and fried chicken sandwiches to poké bowls and Korean BBQ. Second, the kids can be as loud as they like, and there’s room to stretch your legs when sitting at a table gets tiresome.

BELVEDERE SQUARE MARKET
529 E Belvedere Ave., Baltimore, MD 21212.
More than a food market, this North Baltimore hotspot near The Senator Theatre is a great place to dine indoors or out at any time of day. Food vendors include Atwater’s, Ejji Ramen, Plantbar, and The Pizza Trust. The Square hosts a Friday night concert series during the summer months.

STONE MILL BAKERY & CAFE
10751 Falls Rd. Suite 123, Lutherville-Timonium, MD 21093.
If you’re shopping at Greenspring Station or have a kids’ sporting event across the street at Meadowood Regional Park, pop into this bustling cafe for refreshments. Choose from salads, soups, sandwiches, and unparalleled sugar cookies. If the weather’s nice, sit outside by a babbling brook and let the kids climb on the stone turtles.

JASON’S DELI
8874 McGaw Rd., Columbia, MD 21045.
With menus for kids, vegetarians, and gluten-sensitive diners, this reasonably priced chain has long been a favorite for families. (The free ice cream doesn’t hurt!) Sadly, the Timonium location closed during COVID, but the Columbia restaurant is open for business.

MEDIEVAL TIMES
7000 Arundel Mills Circle, Hanover, MD 21076.
If you dread family dinners or just want something different, there’s nothing like a meal and a show set in a medieval Spanish “castle.” Feast on turkey legs–or a surprisingly tasty vegetarian option–as you watch knights on horseback jousting for a fair maiden’s hand. Yes, it’s a bit sexist and over-the-top, but the spectacle is part of the fun. If you’re looking to get your kids off screens and into a real-life adventure, this is it.

he last time the Baltimore Museum of Art was in the headlines (excluding director Christopher Bedford’s resignation announcement in February,) it was for the deaccessioning scandal that rocked the art community. So it must’ve been a happy surprise—maybe even a bit of a relief—when, last July, the museum announced its new “Guarding the Art” exhibit, and there was so much enthusiasm, it crashed the museum’s website.

It’s not so much the content of the new exhibit that makes it remarkable, though the works do come from the 108-year-old Charles Village institution’s world-class collection of over 95,000 objects, some of which have never been shown before—but rather those who have chosen it.

The exhibit, to be on display in two large galleries adjacent to the museum’s famed Cone Collection starting on March 27, is being curated by 17 of the museum’s security guards.

Ranging from a grandmother of nine to a Towson University senior majoring in classical voice performance, the participating museum guards bring a diversity of backgrounds and life experiences to this innovative exhibit. One guard is a former healthcare worker, another a bartender, another an adjunct instructor at the Maryland Institute College of Art, who teaches courses on horror movies. It’s these unique perspectives that the museum aims to put on display, along with the actual artworks.

“Being a guard is so much more than telling people to turn off their flash, to take a step back,” says Elise Tensley, who has been a security guard at the BMA since 2017. “This isn’t just a show about the BMA’s collection, it’s a show based on what we have to offer.”

After all, the security guards might be more familiar with the museum’s collection than most people who walk its halls.

“They probably spend more time than anyone at the museum thinking about and connected with the art,” says Amy Elias, a BMA trustee who conceived the exhibition with chief curator Asma Naeem. The two also enlisted the help of noted art historian and curator Dr. Lowery Stokes Sims, currently the Kress-Beinecke Professor at the National Gallery of Art’s Center for Advanced Study in the Visual Arts, who also provided mentorship to the guards.

“I WAS IMMEDIATELY STRUCK BY THE
FRESH EYES THAT THEY CAST ON WORKS FROM
THE MUSEUM’S COLLECTION.”

“I was immediately struck by the fresh eyes that they cast on works from the museum’s collection,” says Sims. “Hearing their intensely personal rationales for their choices of objects revived my initial feelings of love and awe in museums, and reminded me why I got involved in art and curatorial work in the first place.”

The guards were given access to the BMA’s full collection, including its massive digital database of material, only a very small percentage of which is ever on display. Each guard could pick up to three objects of their choosing—an individualized, intimate alternative to the typically academic process.

But from the outset, the idea was to have the guards do more than just pick the art. They’d be involved in designing the installation, developing the accompanying catalog, working with the conservation team, and planning the relevant programming. For all that extra work, they’d also be paid, in addition to their salaries. Fundraising for the exhibit, which was ultimately financed by a lead grant from the local Pearlstone Family Foundation, included imbursement to the guards for their involvement.

Tensley, a painter herself who has sold commissioned work, chose “Winter’s End,” a 1958 painting by the late Abstract Expressionist and Park School graduate Jane Frank that has only been exhibited twice. “I wanted to give Jane Frank her moment again, as a female artist with Baltimore ties. I’m 37, and in my entire lifetime, this painting hasn’t been displayed.”

While some guards purposely sought out art from the depths of the museum’s archives, others chose works that were deeply familiar. Dereck Mangus, who has had his own artwork exhibited locally in group shows and whose writing has been published in art journals, selected Thomas Ruckle’s “House of Frederick Crey,” a painting he’d come to know over the course of the six years he’s worked at the BMA, because it depicted the Mount Vernon neighborhood where he lives.

“Every museum I’ve ever worked in has had some sort of staff art show,” says Mangus, who has worked as a guard at Boston’s Isabella Stewart Gardner Museum and Harvard Art Museums, as well as the Walters Art Museum, but had never been asked to participate in the curatorial process before. “We’re putting on different hats.”

For Ricardo Castro, a guard since 2019, the familiarity was cultural. Being from a large Puerto Rican family in Delaware, he chose works by artists from Columbia, Equador, and Costa Rica, as a way to honor his heritage.

“It’s a job made of waiting, but it’s also a job of contemplation—we’re seeing everything,” says Rob Kempton, a Maryland native with a master’s in museum studies from Johns Hopkins University who has been a guard since 2016. “It’s a lot of, ‘Where’s the bathroom?’ But you can create experiences, just by getting into a conversation.” He selected works by two renowned local painters, Washington, D.C.’s Alma Thomas and Baltimore’s Grace Hartigan.

This on-the-floor ability to interact—with both the museum-goers and the art itself—was another key element driving the exhibit. Security guards may often blend into the background of a museum, as quiet and stationary as the artifacts they oversee, but they can also participate in the experience—answering questions, offering guidance, becoming part of the discussion.

“There are times when people have questions and there isn’t anyone else to ask besides the security officers,” says Kellen Johnson, the Towson senior who, between his shifts at the BMA, is also a member of the Towson University Chorale and Men’s Chorus groups, and has held solo recitals at the museum.

Johnson chose paintings by the 20th-century German painter Max Beckmann and American painter-muralist Hale Woodruff to reflect his interest in music. Beckmann’s wife, Mathilde, who is featured in the 1939 “Still Life with Large Shell” painting that Johnson picked, was a violinist and singer. Woodruff’s 1928 “Normandy Landscape,” demonstrated his interest in showcasing work by Black artists.

Johnson now cites interacting with museum-goers among his favorite aspects of the job, but when he first started working at the museum in 2013, he initially kept his distance.

“It was just: stand still, don’t interact, and be this invisible presence, except to say, ‘Please don’t touch that,’” he says. “That got very boring,” so he attended lectures, signed up for docent trainings, and read up on the artists, the art, and even the collectors—all so he could bring that knowledge to work. Visitors would ask if he was a docent, says Johnson. “No,” he’d tell them, “I’m just a guard.”

Christopher Bedford, the BMA’s director, would like to give the guards the option to be more than just guards.

“I’m keenly interested in the show because it empowers and foregrounds the authorship of a group of people not traditionally given that role,” says Bedford, now in his sixth year at the museum. “There are [guards] who are interested in ascending the ranks of a museum and exploring the world of art history and curatorial work. This is a way of doing that.”

Bedford sees the informal mentorship of “Guarding the Arts” as one of its most crucial elements—a means to explore, and perhaps ultimately change, how the museum has historically worked.

“There are aspects of the way that we function that just need to be completely turned on their heads,” he says, referring to addressing larger themes of equity, representation, and shared authorship. “This is a way of doing that.” (According to the Association of Art Museum Directors, in 2018, only four percent of curator roles in U.S. art museums were held by African Americans.)

“[Mentoring] is the engine that’s propelling this forward,” Naeem says about the exhibit, “to perhaps create new futures and new careers for some of the guards.” Those guards, she says, “are a true mirror to the public.”

Baltimore native Sara Ruark, who came to the BMA in 2018 and studied film at Towson University, agrees, seeing the guards as a sort of bridge.

“WE SEE NOT JUST WHAT’S GOING
ON IN THE MUSEUM, BUT WHAT’S
GOING ON IN THE COMMUNITY.”

“We’re both outsiders and insiders,” says Ruark, who selected Dutch painter and sculptor Karel Appel’s 1962 painting “A World in Darkness,” as well as a mid-20th century miniature totem pole by an unidentified Haida artist, neither of which she had seen before. “We see not just what’s going on in the museum, but what’s going on in the community.”

This gives the exhibit a sense of accessibility, she says, one that’s particularly relevant to Baltimore’s multifaceted artistic community.

“I think people who don’t realize how rich the art world is here give Baltimore a lot of flack,” says Ruark. Beyond the big-name institutions and exhibitions, “[There are] local artists who sell stuff under a bridge that’s simply stunning, craft shows in decrepit churches—I love that about this city.”

Though this isn’t the first time a museum has put on an exhibit with participation from its own security guards—New York’s Museum of Modern Art staged a show called “Beyond the Uniform” in 2020 that included a playlist from its guards—Bedford says the BMA show wasn’t patterned after anything else.

“It was modeled around the idea that shared curatorial authorship around our hierarchy would yield really unexpected results,” he says. “[Baltimore] is a place that is willing to embrace unorthodox ideas. It’s bold, a little quirky…I’m really hopeful that this will be the first of many exhibitions that will be unconventionally authored, by guards or others. I think it can become a hallmark of the museum.”

“This was a chance to have a real tangible project, with real feedback and results,” says Kempton, who is looking forward to seeing Hartigan’s 1957 abstract painting “Interior, The Creeks” and Thomas’ 1972 work “Evening Glow” on display. “Dr. Sims has said that this show privileges and deprivileges at the same time. It’s demystifying the entire museum process. To see that and to play a meaningful role in that is significant.”

On display through July 10, the exhibition will feature as many as 26 objects. As of press time, an opening reception was still in the planning stages.

Traci Archable-Frederick, a Baltimore native who served in the U.S. Army and Maryland National Guard before coming to the BMA in 2006, chose Mickalene Thomas’s 2021 “Resist #2,” as she wanted a piece that reflected the times, in the midst of the coronavirus pandemic and in relation to the demonstrations that swept the country in the wake of the George Floyd’s murder.

Thomas’ piece, a collage that combines protest images with acrylic paint, rhinestones, and glitter, was recently acquired by the BMA and joins the Brooklyn-based artist’s installation, “A Moment’s Pleasure,” that has transformed the museum’s East Lobby.

“This was it right here,” says Archable-Frederick. “It was speaking to everything that was happening.”

By choosing art works that speak not only to the contemporary world but to themselves, these 17 guards will be giving a very personal perspective. And yes, they’ll be watching.

In the spring of 2019, Nia June found herself in the living room of a home in Windsor Mill. She described it as “old-school.” There were many pictures on the walls and others lined the tables. There was plastic covering on the matching vintage couches. The Baltimore poet was there for work, though it didn’t feel like it.

“It felt like home,” says June, pictured second from left, who spent the day listening to stories from the three generations of Black women who resided there: Najah Johnson; her daughter, Indigo; and her grandmother, Ethel Zimmerman. “Seeing the way her grandchild and great-grandchild just folded to her—they sat at her feet, they loved her so much, and just took care of her. It was beautiful.”

Zimmerman died last January, at 86 years old, but she will now live on in the permanent collection of The Baltimore Museum of Art. June’s debut film, A Black Girl’s Country, inspired by her poem of the same name, was recently acquired by the BMA as part of its new initiative to obtain more works by artists of color and those with ties to Baltimore.

It all started with a poem that June wrote as a student at Towson University in 2018. As the only Black woman in her poetry class, she felt frustrated and out of place, with her work constantly misunderstood by her classmates, many of whom were white men. She wrote her feelings into a poem that she now describes as a “home for Black women.”

The short film based on that poem, written and directed with local cinematographer Kirby Griffin, right, and musician APoetNamedNate, left, features more than 50 Black women and men set to the backdrop of Charm City, with June’s words echoing in the background.

“In person, Nia is this very delicate, soft-spoken woman, and then you see her onstage and it’s just like pure fire,” says Griffin, who filmed all the video footage, while APoetNamedNate created the music to accompany June’s poem. Together, their goal was to celebrate Baltimore’s Black community.

“Representation was really important to us,” says June, who is now an arts educator herself. “I’ve had a lot of students who are young Black girls tell me that they watch the film every morning to start their day and make them feel good. A lot of Black women have told me they cried, or dads have said they show it to their daughters.”

The BMA first interacted with the film during the COVID-19 pandemic, when it was showcased in the “Screening Room,” a virtual space where visitors could quench their thirst for local artwork while the museum’s doors remained closed, quickly becoming a fan favorite.

“This is probably one of the best things that happened to us last year,” says chief curator Asma Naeem. “This work is a portrait of so many incredibly moving and powerful and inspiring people.”

That includes Sharayna Ashanti Christmas (second from right) the founder of Necessary Tomorrows, whose creative consulting branch helped the BMA acquire the film.

“Black artists need to know that they have someone that can advocate on their behalf,” says Christmas, whose radical multimedia platform works to promote art by creatives of color, helping to raise more than $5,000 in emergency relief funding for Black artists in 2020. “They also need to learn how to advocate for themselves.”

Per June’s wishes, the film is still available for free on YouTube, where it has amassed more than 8,000 views. But as it’s one of the first films by a local Black artist to join the BMA’s collection, Christmas see it as a landmark.

“It’s being acquired in the permanent collection of a prestigious museum located in Baltimore and the work is by three artists that are from Baltimore and it’s about Black women,” she says. “I don’t think it gets any more historic than that.”

Baltimoreans can feel some measure of pride visiting The Andy Warhol Museum in Pittsburgh. Located downtown in a renovated industrial warehouse—a “factory,” if you will—just a few miles from where Warhol grew up, the sprawling complex houses a gritty and glittering retrospective of his life, with some familiar artwork and Baltimore personalities in the mix.

There’s a huge Last Supper canvas on view. And there’s a massive Camouflage painting and a “fright wig” Self-Portrait, too—just like at the BMA.

A BMA press release by Alice Steinbach—director of public information at the time, she later wrote for The Sun and won a Pulitzer Prize in 1985—noted that “this major exhibition will offer Baltimoreans their first chance to see all the famous Warhol ‘Pop’ paintings (soup cans, Liz Taylor, Marilyn Monroe, etc.), which have filtered down into the mainstream of everyday life. . . .”

Baltimoreans weren’t particularly impressed. The show included one of Warhol’s large Mao portraits, and dozens of BMA members cancelled their memberships in protest. “To my shock and amazement,” says Richardson, “they claimed we were Communists.”

The press wasn’t much kinder. The Sun called Warhol “boring” and “old news,” while The Columbia Flier referred to him as “a humorless, self-contained freak.” They didn’t think much of the paintings, either.

There was a similar reaction after Richardson and the BMA acquired Warhol’s later work after his death. When the museum bought The Last Supper for $682,000—the most it had ever paid for a single work of art—in 1989, “all hell broke loose,” recalls Richardson.

Comprised of two silkscreened images of Leonardo’s painting, the piece was religious in subject matter, massive in size—six-and-a-half feet high and 25-and-a-half feet long—and tinted yellow, or “puke green” as John Waters describes it.

“People howled about it,” says Waters, himself a BMA trustee in the 1990s. “Everybody flipped out.”

From limited in-person exhibitions to virtual collections, the art world continues to create and evolve in the wake of the coronavirus. This September, support local galleries and artists with these local happenings.

Contemporary

SUMMER ’20
Through the end of the month, the prestigious C. Grimaldis Gallery in Mount Vernon hosts its annual must-see summer exhibit featuring a variety of works across all genres, including those by collage artist Zoë Charlton, light installationist Chul-Hyun Ahn, photographer Ben Marcin, filmmaker John Waters, and painter Beverly McIver.  To 9/26. C. Grimadlis Gallery. Online, or in person by appointment only. Tues.-Sat. 11 a.m.-5 p.m. Free.

JO SMAIL: BEES WITH STICKY FEET
Due to popular demand, Hampden’s Goya Contemporary Gallery has extended this summer exhibit featuring more than 30 works by the prolific South African-born, Baltimore-based artist Jo Smail. Across pigment prints and fabric on wood, each collage is an exploration of past and present through shape, pat- tern, and texture. The gallery will also be presenting Smail’s work via the virtual BMA Salon through January 2021. To 9/30. Goya Contemporary Gallery. Online, or in person by appointment only. Tues.-Sat. 10 a.m.-6 p.m., Sun. 12-5 p.m. Free.

MONO PLATFORM
With its exhibition space closed to the public, the Station North gallery continues its goal of showcasing abstract and reductive art by emerging and mid-career artists through this online collection, including colorful and compelling paper works, paintings, sculpture, and photography. We personally love the bright painted panels of Tim Doud, co-founder of local collaborative art project, ’sindkit. To 12/31. Mono Practice. Online. Free.

Living History

FREEDOM BOUND: RUNAWAYS OF THE CHESAPEAKE 
This new exhibit at the Reginald F. Lewis Museum presents nine vignettes of people—slaves, indentured servants, and convict servants—from the Chesapeake region who sought freedom from bondage between the Colonial period and the American Civil War. Tales of resistance and resilience, each tells a larger story about an experience shared by thousands in bondage who lived and labored in Maryland. 9/1-30. Reginald F. Lewis Museum. Online. Free.

FORGOTTEN FIGHT: THE STRUGGLE FOR VOTING RIGHTS IN MARYLAND
The year 2020 marks the 100th and 150th anniversary of the ratification of the 19th and 15th Amendments, respectively. This new virtual, interactive exhibition from the Maryland Historical Society honors the women who devoted their lives to women’s suffrage and fought an uphill battle for the right to vote across the state. 9/9-3/31/21. Maryland Historical Society. Online. Free.

Art of the Times

THE FREQUENCY OF US
Co-curated by multidisciplinary artists Abdu Ali and Karryl Eugene, the nomadic arts platform As They Lay returns with its second virtual exhibition, an all-new series showcasing selected video works by up-and-coming artists who amplify the importance of Black archival curation and its ability to reshape aspects of culture for the growth of the Black gaze. The exhibit aims to empower viewers to interrogate monolithic ideologies that center a white patriarchal gaze. 9/17-19. As They Lay. Online via Zoom. Free. 

KOTA EZAWA’S NATIONAL ANTHEM
Though the BMA was still officially closed as of press time, its outdoor Spring House is now open to the public and presenting National Anthem, a short, animated film and powerful meditation on protest and patriotism by California artist Kota Ezawa. The museum’s Go Mobile App provided additional commentary from museum curators on the work and the space, which was a former workspace for enslaved people in Baltimore. The Baltimore Museum of Art, Latrobe Spring House. In person. Tues.- Sun. 10 a.m.-8 p.m. Free.

REMOTE
Though their spring semester was cut short, MICA Forum Class students still created art, with works from 15 artists now on view through this virtual 3-D gallery in partnership with Pigment Sauvage, an artist-run gallery in Bolton Hill. Browse powerful political photographs of installation art by Yuhan Shen, digital drawings turned puzzles by Stefanie Zins, colorful isolation-inspired paintings by Gloria Logan, autobiographical transferred drawings by Gaeun Chloe Kim, and more. To 10/9. Maryland Institute College of Art. Online. Free.

OPEN

Café Dear Leon: Canton locals have fallen for this new coffee-and-pastry spot that opened earlier this month in the former home of Holy Crepe Cafe on O’Donnell Square. From the wooden benches and countertops to the almond croissants and oat pecan chocolate chip cookies, everything is made by the owners from scratch. Named after co-owner Min Kim’s son, Leon, the bright and airy shop offers a coffee and tea program with blends sourced from Ceremony Coffee Roasters, as well as morning pastries, house-made granola bars, loaf cakes, and traditional Japanese egg sandwiches.

Snow Cone Sisters: Perhaps one of the most creative COVID-19 pivot projects we’ve seen yet comes from chef John Shields and his team at Gertrude’s Chesapeake Kitchen at the Baltimore Museum of Art. While the museum is still closed, last week, curators debuted a mobile audio tour for visitors to browse its exterior buildings, sculptures, and exhibits. And to ensure audiences have a spot to grab some sustenance while taking in the works, Gertrude’s is launching an outdoor snack kiosk on Saturday, August 15. Snow Cone Sisters—aptly named after the BMA’s famous Cone Collection of early to mid-20th century works gifted by sisters Etta and Claribel Cone—will be open Tuesday-Sunday from 11 a.m. to dusk, serving gourmet hot dogs and kielbasa on housemade milk bread rolls and, of course, the namesake snow cones. Cool off with flavors such as Tutti Frutti, birthday cake, chocolate-covered cherry, and Key Lime pie. Gertrude’s is also open for outdoor dining and carryout if you’d like to enjoy a more filling meal on the grounds or grab one on your way home.

Hungry Like the Wolfe: Cleverly named after its location on South Wolfe Street, this new pop-up from former Fork & Wrench chefs Cyrus Keefer and Adam Scanlon has taken over the Red Star in Fells Point. Available for outdoor dining and carryout, the menu of riffs on classic tavern fare makes use of produce from Monkton’s Karma Farm. Highlights include a cherry tomato and sourdough salad with fresh basil, maple-sriracha fried chicken wings, a Juicy Lucy burger stuffed with bleu cheese, and a French bread pizza topped with mushrooms and gruyere.

Cafe 1908: This seafood-centric spot has received a warm welcome from the Mt. Vernon neighborhood, thanks to its drool-worthy crab cakes, lobster rolls, seafood salad wraps, turkey burgers, and vegan options. The longtime caterer now offers daily specials—expect mix-and-match cauliflower, shrimp, jerk chicken, or fish tacos on Tuesdays, for example—out of its new permanent storefront at 7 W. Preston St.

The Periodic Table Restaurant & Bar: If you’re in search of an al fresco spot to try in Howard County, add this new Columbia restaurant to your list. Equipped with distanced outdoor tables, as well as indoor seating, the restaurant off of Centre Park Drive is officially open with a menu of seasonal cocktails, local beers (look out for the likes of Diamondback Beer and Denizens Brewing Co.), small plates, and burgers. Plus, hearty main dishes include Gochujang-glazed pork belly and grilled swordfish with lump crab and Thai basil cream.

NEWS

The Urban Oyster: Loyalists were heartbroken when chef Jasmine Norton announced that she would be closing her brick-and-mortar restaurant at McHenry Row in Locust Point last month. But luckily, the chef assured this wasn’t the last we’d see of her. And as she continues her search for another permanent home, Norton will be operating out of the Hyatt Baltimore Inner Harbor just a few miles away. Beginning August 20, fans will be able to enjoy The Urban Oyster’s signature oysters, tacos, sandwiches, and fried seafood baskets for curbside carryout and delivery via Grubhub and Doordash.

EPICUREAN EVENTS

8/14: Courtyard Cocktails with Cane Collective

If you haven’t had the chance to stop by Old Line Spirits’ new outdoor courtyard in Highlandtown, now’s your chance. Aaron Joseph of Cane Collective is taking over the bar this Friday night to showcase refreshing summer cocktails that fuse his handcrafted mixers with Old Line’s whiskey, rum, and brand new vodka. Cane Collective’s Tropical Green Orchard mixer (green apple syrup, lime, and Wight tropical tea), for example, pairs perfectly with the distillery’s single malt whiskey. Plus, Ekiben will be on site slinging steamed buns and rice bowls to accompany all of the drinks.

EAT

Aug. 8: Tianquiztli

Creative Alliance. 3134 Eastern Ave. 12-3 p.m. Free.

Celebrate the flavors and traditions of Latin America at this outdoor market in the lot across the street from the Creative Alliance in Highlandtown. For its first installment, Tianquiztly—which means marketplace in Nahuatl, the language of the Aztecs—will focus on maize (corn), a staple in Latin American cuisine. Upper Fells Point neighbors Cocina Luchadoras will be on site serving their handmade tortillas and other recipes featuring corn, while local artists showcase works available for purchase and musicians David Vass and Jorge Gutierrez provide the live soundtrack for the afternoon.

DRINK

Aug. 8: 8 Years of Magic with Union Craft Brewing

Facebook Live. 8 p.m. Free.

Magical is one way to sum up Union Craft Brewing’s eight years since debuting in Hampden. Though the team is unable to throw a traditional birthday blowout in the taproom this year, they’re still celebrating via Facebook Live. DJ James Nasty will be providing the music, and UCB’s brew crew will be hosting a talk show to kick off the party on Saturday night. To keep the celebrations going, Union will release three new beers over the next few weeks and bring back its beloved Double Duckpin DIPA. Plus, loyalists can show their support by grabbing one of Union’s special anniversary boxes that include two of each of the new beers, as well as an eighth-anniversary pint glass and a commemorative Magic 8 Ball.

SEE

Aug. 7-9: National Anthem at the Baltimore Museum of Art

Baltimore Museum of Art. 10 Art Museum Dr. 10 a.m.-8 p.m.. Free.

The BMA’s team knows how much visitors miss strolling through their vast galleries and gazing at their renowned collections, so this week, they are launching new outdoor programming for enthusiasts to enjoy. Premiering in the Latrobe Spring House, Kota Ezawa’s National Anthem is a single-channel animated video that draws inspiration from football players like Colin Kaepernick who took a knee, raised fists, or locked arms during the National Anthem to call attention to racial inequality and police brutality. After watching the powerful video, you can explore the grounds, visit the Sculpture Gardens, and learn about the exterior art with BMA’s Go Mobile audio tour.

HEAR

Aug. 8: WTMD’s Pirate Radio Concert

Multiple locations including Canton Waterfront Park. 6-8 p.m. Free.

While COVID-19 may have forced WTMD to batten down the hatches and cancel its famous First Thursdays concert series, the Towson radio station has not deserted its duty to bring free live music to Charm City. This weekend, WTMD organizers, along with Rufus Roundtree and Da Bmore Brass Factory, are boarding Urban Pirates’ flagship vessel to debut their floating concert. The band will be cruising through Canton, Fells Point, Federal Hill, and Locust Point while playing their funky, jazzy tunes for locals to enjoy safely on shore or aboard their own boat.

DO

Aug. 9: Second Saturdays in Old Ellicott City

Old Ellicott City. 8321 Main Street. 10 a.m-8 p.m. Free.

Spend your Saturday strolling down Main Street in Ellicott City to shop ‘til you drop. More than thirty boutiques—including Poppy and Stella, Sweet Elizabeth Jane, and Reclaimed By You—will be offering sales all day so you can snag a pair of new shoes, a fresh outfit, and even some art to bedeck your bare walls. Main Street will also be hosting outdoor dining, live music, and creative fitness classes to help neighbors make the most of their weekends.

Visual Art

Eye to Eye

Rethink the way African-American male bodies are viewed at this new exhibition featuring artists Christopher Batten, Schroeder Cherry, and James Williams II. Observations are both welcomed and obscured in these three contemporary painters’ works. Stop by Oct. 10 from 5-8 p.m. to celebrate the pieces at the opening reception. Oct. 10 through Nov. 9. Catalyst Contemporary, 523 N. Charles St.

Elizabeth Catlett: Artist as Activist

Elizabeth Catlett spent a lifetime using her art to advocate for social and political change, lending her support to Mexican workers and African-Americans living under racist policies during the Jim Crow era. Starting this month, dozens of her sculptures and graphic prints will go on display at the Reginald F. Lewis Museum, beginning a long stretch of programming surrounding the iconic artist-activist. Oct. 26 through March 1, 2020. Reginald F. Lewis Museum, 830 E. Pratt St.

Literature

Story Time with Rachel Kolar

Grab your littlest ghouls and head to The Children’s Bookstore for this story time with local author Rachel Kolar, who will read from and sign her book of spooky retellings of classic nursery rhymes. Enjoy such spirited new versions as “We Willie Werewolf” and “Mary Had a Little Ghost,” and don’t forget to grab your own copy of Mother Ghost: Nursery Rhymes for Little Monsters. Oct. 19. 1-2 p.m.The Children’s Bookstore, 4717 Harford Rd.

An Evening with Mike Rowe: The Way I Heard It

Baltimore’s own jack of all trades and Discovery Channel superstar Mike Rowe is coming home to share some highlights from his new book, The Way I Heard It, featuring a collection of 35 true(ish) stories about figures you think you know. Grab your copy at the door and join hosts from The Ivy Bookshop for a moderated Q&A and audience questions. Oct. 19. 7-9 p.m. Church of the Redeemer, Baltimore, 5603 N. Charles St.

Music

Off the Cuff: Brahms Symphony No. 4

Johann Brahms’ “Symphony No. 4” represents a transitional period from the lush Romantics to the very beginnings of the 20th century’s modernists. Join Baltimore Symphony Orchestra conductor Marin Alsop for an evening of food, drinks, and lively conversation as she reveals the importance of this 19th-century master work. 7 p.m. Oct. 19. Joseph Meyerhoff Symphony Hall, 1212 Cathedral St.

Theatre

Charm City Fringe Festival

Charm City Fringe is back and ready to spread its stories all over the Bromo Arts & Entertainment District. Catch such exciting new pieces as WombWorks’ The Channeling of Ms. Sybby Grant, Amanda Erin Miller’s The Jew in the Ashram solo show, and Tres Brujas Productions’ exploration of witchcraft and Virginia Woolf, Modern Witches. There are 10 days of productions across six venues to explore, so we suggest you start making your checklist now. Oct. 10-20. Various locations.

August Wilson’s Radio Golf

As we roll ever closer to an election year, August Wilson’s final play feels as timely as ever. Resident company member Dawn Ursula will be joined by Charles Dumas, Anton Floyd, Jamil A.C. Mangan, and Jason B. McIntosh on the Everyman stage for this tale of real estate developer Harmond Wikins’ run at becoming Pittsburgh’s first black mayor. Oct. 15 through Nov. 19. Everyman Theatre, 315 W. Fayette St.

Stoop Storytelling: Twilight Zone

Everyone knows someone who swears that thing that went bump in the night was more than their imagination. Meet a few more at this month’s iteration of the Stoop Storytelling series featuring takes of all things strange and supernatural. Be sure to come early for cocktails and live music from local rockers Super City. 7 p.m. Oct. 24. The Senator Theatre, 5904 York Rd.

Film

Art, Youth, and Justice Day at the Baltimore Museum of Art

Greenmount West Community Center and Advocates for Children and Youth are celebrating Youth Justice Month with a whole day of programming at the Baltimore Museum of Art. In addition to self-guided tours of Generations: A History of Black Abstract Art (the ticketed exhibition will be free all weekend long) and an evening concert, the day will feature screenings and panels of both PUSHOUT: The Criminalization of Black Girls in Schools and Rethink Baltimore. 12-5 p.m. Oct. 26. Baltimore Museum of Art, 10 Art Museum Dr.

“Isn’t life a series of images that change as they repeat themselves?”

It’s a question that was asked by Andy Warhol decades ago, likely rhetorically. But all the same, as the summer fades, we find ourselves thinking through the many changes this city’s artists and performers have seen in the past year, and the ones they have in store for the months to come.

This June, The Baltimore Symphony Orchestra suffered their first work stoppage in 31 years and musicians took to the streets to protest the institution’s management in the wake of a financial crisis. But still the band plays on, determined to carry on their legacy as a world-class ensemble.

In more encouraging news, in July, a year after selling pieces by Warhol, Franz Kline, Robert Rauschenberg, and others to acquire works by women and people of color, the Baltimore Museum of Art premiered an exhibition featuring black artists from the past two centuries, reconguring its Contemporary Wing to highlight the new acquisitions. And in 2020, the museum plans to celebrate the 100th anniversary of the 19th Amendment with a full year of exhibits and events dedicated to women artists.

Meanwhile, downtown at Everyman Theatre, room is currently being made for a new upstairs stage, which will play host to a new festival featuring contemporary works by women next year. And around the corner at the former Eutaw Savings Bank, work is underway to expand the France-Merrick Performing Arts Center. Farther north, Single Carrot Theatre left behind its home in Remington to spread its shows around the city, allowing long-wandering, color-conscious troupe ArtsCentric to put down roots in the old space.

Even some of the city’s oldest cultural cornerstones are feeling the winds of change. Many historic homes and museums are finally taking steps to address their histories with slavery and indentured servitude and bring those stories to the forefront—leading to new programming, exhibitions, and discoveries.

There’s almost too much to keep track of, but as we plan visits to our favorite hallowed halls and holes in the wall, we look forward to what we may find there. These new developments—whether made to physical foundations or the fundamental ways we think about a place—each make their subtle change to the repeating image. And, eventually, they evolve into a whole new scene.

Through Dec. 1: Hitching Their Dreams to Untamed Stars: Joyce J. Scott & Elizabeth Talford Scott
For 60 years, MacArthur award-winning artist Joyce J. Scott lived in Baltimore with her mother, Elizabeth Talford Scott, who passed away in 2011. This exhibit will bring together a collection of nine pieces of art that the two made, either collaboratively or separately. There will be quilts, beaded and glass sculptures, and weavings, among other types of art, that showcase the elder Scott’s experience in the aftermath of slavery and the influence she had on her daughter. Baltimore Museum of Art, 10 Art Museum Dr.

Sept. 3-Oct. 6: Proof
Everyman’s biggest season yet opens with this Pulitzer and Tony Award-winning classic about a father and daughter grappling with genius, identity, and mental illness in the past and present. Audiences who saw resident company member Megan Anderson shine as Catherine in the 2003 rendition will delight in seeing her take on the role of Catherine’s older sister, Claire, in this new performance. Everyman Theatre, 315 W. Fayette St.

Sept. 3-Oct. 6: Daniel Stuelpnagel Solo Show
This Baltimore native has showcased his acrylic paintings nationwide for more than 20 years. In 2017, Stuelpnagel had the distinguished honor of being a featured artist for TEDxJHU at Johns Hopkins University. Now, his collection, which encompasses an interest in science, architecture, and technology with dynamic imagery, is on display at this Fells Point contemporary gallery. The Alchemy of Art, 1637 Eastern Ave.

Sept. 6-29: Twelve Angry Jurors
The decision on a life—that’s what this is all about. Experience Reginald Rose’s electrified drama, the title of which has been given a timely update, about a dozen men and women gathered to determine whether an accused teenager is guilty of murdering his father. Tempers flare as the vote comes to 11-1 and evidence is re-examined. This courtroom drama will keep audiences on the edge of their seats and thinking about exactly what it means to live in a democracy. Vagabond Players, 806 S. Broadway.

Sept. 11-Oct. 19: Bianco e Nero
Black and white does not always have to mean plain and simple. Terry Thompson explores the boundaries of maximalism and minimalism in his new exhibition of monochromatic works. With some works bustling and busy and others mellow and tranquilizing, Thompson forces viewers to focus on the encryption layered throughout this chaotic series. Become entranced by his optical illusions and feel the energy of his monochromatic world. Y:ART Gallery, 3402 Gough St.

Sept. 11-Oct. 19: Miss You Like Hell
Mother-daughter relationships can be a roller coaster for anyone, but this especially complicated example is threatened by intense immigration policies. Join whip-smart, deeply imaginative teenager Olivia and her free-spirited Latina mother on a cross-country road trip as they come to understand what sets them apart and what connects them forever. This musical without borders is a must-see and a reminder to audiences that theater has the power to make politics personal. Baltimore Center Stage,
700 N. Calvert St.

Sept. 13-Oct. 13: Mr. Wolf
In their first show after leaving behind their Remington theater in favor of ever-changing performance spaces, Single Carrot Theatre will take over the St. John’s Episcopal Church rectory to explore broken ties and reconciliation in Mr. Wolf, a tale of a child abducted and returned to her family more than a decade later. St. John’s Episcopal Church, 3009 Greenmount Ave.

Sept. 13-15: Roots & RaÍces Festival
This Charm City-based festival celebrates and showcases the work of local immigrant artists. The festivities begin Friday evening at Creative Alliance with a dinner and gala, followed by a SOMOS Migrantes film feature and awards ceremony. Saturday’s lineup includes live music and performance art at Little Lithuanian Park. Between entertainment, enjoy tasty bites at the El Mercado market.

Sept. 18-21, Oct. 2-5: Best of Enemies
Based on the bestselling novel by Osha Gray Davidson, which recently became a major motion picture, Best of Enemies depicts prejudice in the South through the relationship between C.P. Ellis, a leader in the Ku Klux Klan, and Ann Atwater, an African-American civil rights activist. This co-production by the McDaniel College and Coppin State University theater programs brings to life Mark St. Germain’s adaptation of a true story that captures the controversy of school desegregation. Coppin State University and McDaniel College.

Sept. 19-Nov. 10: Second Tri-Annual Maryland State Artist Registry Juried Exhibition
Maryland Art Place has partnered with the Maryland State Art Council to present this statewide exhibition of pieces voted in by jurors. After receiving submissions of all media types (including literary arts), with a heavy emphasis on visual and performing arts, a select few were found worthy for entry. Experience the curated pieces as they highlight the wide range of skilled artists and artwork featured on the Maryland State Arts Council Artist Registry. Maryland Art Place, 218 W. Saratoga St.

Courtesy of Mono Practice

Sept. 20: Gallery Opening: Retrospective
The Baltimore School for the Arts has been educating and promoting talent in the city for four decades now. In honor of its anniversary, the Mount Vernon institution will highlight the creations of its alumni in this reflective new exhibition. Segal Gallery in Baltimore School for the Arts, 712 Cathedral St.

Sept. 20-21: Star Wars: The Empire Strikes Back—In Concert
A mix of science fiction, melodrama, and galactic action, iconic film The Empire Strikes Back will be screened alongside a live orchestra for two nights this month. Conducted by Nicholas Hersh, the Baltimore Symphony Orchestra will perform John Williams’ noteworthy score as Jedi Master Yoda teaches Luke Skywalker about the Force. Joseph Meyerhoff Symphony Hall, 1212 Cathedral St.

Sept. 28: Made in Baltimore Short Film Festival
Whether you’re a fan of animation, horror, or documentary, all these genres and more will be featured at this celebration of Baltimore-inspired film. Works are submitted by local filmmakers and then judged on technical ability, originality, and Baltimore flavor. You won’t want to miss this shot at getting a glimpse of the best up-and-coming film talent Charm City has to offer. Creative Alliance, 3134 Eastern Ave.

Sept. 29, 2019-Jan. 19, 2020: Generations: A History of Black Abstract Art
This touring exhibition will arrive under a new name and with an expanded collection of more than 80 paintings, sculptures, and mixed media pieces. This exploration of abstract art as a political choice and a personal statement for black artists will include both pioneers of post-war abstraction, such
as Norman Lewis and Alma W. Thomas, and more recent artists such as Kevin Beasley and Lorna Simpson. The Baltimore Museum of Art, 10 Art Museum Dr.

Sept. 29, 2019-Jan. 12, 2020: Melvin Edwards: The Architecture of Being
The pioneer of contemporary sculpture showcased here is also the great-great-great-grandson of a West African blacksmith. Explore how he conveys the influence of his African roots and the experience of his time living, traveling, and teaching
in Africa for many years through this collection
of 16 works from across the four decades of his incredible career. The Baltimore Museum of Art, 10 Art Museum Dr.

Oct. 4-31: Cordially Invited
For the second year in a row, Make Studio is offering a look at the works of artists with disabilities from studios around the world. This invitational exhibition will feature artists from as far away as Australia alongside local talents and celebrate the work of progressive art studios through pop-ups, artist talks, and workshops around the city. Schwing Art Center, 3326 Keswick Rd. & other locations.

Oct. 5-6: Doors Open Baltimore
Charm City has no shortage of buildings with unique designs and histories, and this annual citywide architectural exploration is the perfect opportunity to visit as many as possible. Take free self-guided walking tours through more than 50 buildings and neighborhoods, including new sites such as 414 Light Street and decades-old spots such as The Baltimore Basilica and The Arch Social Club, or sign up for bike or bus tours to discover some of Baltimore’s most interesting spaces and places on wheels. Locations vary.

Oct. 5-Sept. 6, 2020: The Secret Life of Earth: Alive! Awake! (And Possibly Really Angry!)
AVAM’s yearly exhibition is back, and it has a bone to pick with the citizens of Earth. This collection of works seeks to show visitors the state of our planet now and where it could be going if we’re not careful. Take in pieces such as Dr. Bob Hieronimus’ original 1972 Earth Day poster, Judy Tallwing’s Spirit Bear painting (which inspired 22 global poets to join AVAM in protesting the placement of an oil pipeline through Canada), and Bobby Adams’ kitchen diorama, Global Warming. American Visionary Art Museum, 800 Key Hwy.

Courtesy of AVAM

Courtesy of the Maryland Historical Society

Oct. 5-Oct. 2020: Spectrum of Fashion: Celebrating Maryland’s Style
Explore the wearable art that has defined generations of Maryland dwellers, from everyday workers to Duchess of Windsor Wallis Simpson, at this yearlong exhibition. Attend the opening gala on Oct. 5 for an early peek at the nearly 100 pieces while mingling with homegrown fashion star Christian Siriano. Maryland Historical Society, 201 W. Monument St.

Oct. 6-Jan.5, 2020: Designing the New: Charles Rennie Mackintosh and the Glasgow Style
Celebrating the 150th anniversary of iconic Scottish architect Charles Rennie Mackintosh’s birth, this is the first exhibition in a generation to highlight his work. There will be about 165 pieces on view from across various mediums, including furniture, textiles, posters, and architectural drawings. The link between Glasgow and Baltimore as the cities grew both industrially and artistically will also be explored.The Walters Art Museum, 600 N. Charles St.

Oct. 10-20: Charm City Fringe Festival
Experimental art installations, slam poetry, street acrobatics, puppet debates, dance parties—with the sky as the limit, all this and more is possible at the eighth annual Charm City Fringe Festival. This celebration of quirky theater and performing arts aims to engage diverse communities and elevate the local theater scene. The 11 days of performances across multiple venues contribute to the cultivation of Baltimore as a hub for art without boundaries. Bromo Arts & Entertainment District, locations vary.

Oct. 11-14, 17-20: Proxy
Rapid Lemon Productions concludes its 2019 Season of Belief with the world premiere of Proxy, by local authors Alex Reeves and Nell Quinn-Gibney. Directed by T.P. Huth from Inkubator New Works Development Laboratory, this play asks the challenging question, “When we die, who cares for those we leave behind?” Baltimore Theatre Project, 45 W. Preston St.

Oct. 18-20: The Snow Queen
During the premiere performance of the Ballet Theatre of Maryland’s new season, the story of The Snow Queen will come alive on the Maryland Hall for the Creative Arts stage. Watch in awe as local ballerinas use their graceful movements to bring to life the famous Hans Christian Andersen fairytale, which also inspired the Disney blockbuster Frozen. On your way out of the Annapolis theatre, be sure to grab information about the troupe’s annual performance of The Nutcracker in December as well. Maryland Hall for the Creative Arts, 801 Chase St., Annapolis.

Oct. 23-Nov. 30: Marc Boone
Boone’s art has always had two unchanging factors:
he creates works in series and employs a studio sound backdrop. In his latest exhibition, Shaman’s Way, he focuses on medicine men and women who connect with nature and all creation to influence the world of good and evil. Come experience different worlds through unique art and jazz musicians and vocalists as Boone attempts to capture some magical conjuring.Y:ART Gallery, 3402 Gough St.

Nov. 16-17: Refuge: Needing, Seeking, Finding
This collection of works from Full Circle Dance Company explores varied themes through separate works explicitly created to be shown together. The result is a challenging yet beautiful array of pieces tackling such subjects as the global refugee crisis, America’s dark past with lynching, mental illness, loss, and what exactly home means through new music and stunning choreography. Baltimore Theatre Project, 45 W. Preston St.

Visual Art

Time and Place

In this second exhibition at the reopened 1 West Mount Vernon Place, contemplate the bridges between past and present through Jay Gould’s evocative portraits and Antonio McAfee’s haunting composite images from W.E.B. DuBois’ Exhibit of American Negroes. The combination of the two artists work offers a contemporary perspective on 19th-century imagery. Through March 1, 2020. The Walters Art Museum, 600 N. Charles St.

Music

Lower Dens Album Release

Join Jana Hunter and Nate Nelson as they celebrate the release of The Competition and kick off a month-long tour with two nights of shows at Rituals in the former home of The Windup Space in Station North. Soak up their synth-laced beats and dance like the lead in your favorite ‘80s heartbreaker before these local legends head out of town for September. 8 p.m. to 1 a.m., Aug. 31 and Sept. 1. Rituals, 12 W. North Ave.

Literature

Jessica Gregg: News From This Lonesome City

Jessica Gregg has spent the past decade living in and writing about the city her family has called home for five generations. This new collection of poems from the editor of Baltimore’s Child and Baltimore’s Style explores the experiences gathered by living and working in Baltimore and the loneliness, fear, and ultimate hope that they inspire. Join Gregg at Bird in Hand for a discussion of these new verses and the stories that inspired them. 7-9 p.m., Bird in Hand Charles Village, 11 E. 33rd St.

Film

2019 Black Femme Supremacy Film Fest

Back for its second year at the SNF Parkway, this weekend-long film festival celebrating and connecting black femme filmmakers will feature dozens of films, from music videos to documentaries. This year’s theme is “Access,” and the idea will guide programming throughout the festival. Be sure to catch screenings of Baltimore-made docs such as B. Monet’s Ballet After Dark and Antonio Hernadez’s Indelible: Abdu Ali, both about local artists changing this city for the better. Aug. 30 to Sept. 1. The SNF Parkway Theatre, 5 W. North Ave.

News

Home Sweet Home for Current Space

If you haven’t been by 421 North Howard Street recently, we have good news for you. After three long years of red tape and renovation, Current Space finally has the forever home they’ve been after. Owners Julianne Hamilton and Michael Benevento had been working to acquire the building since 2015 and announced the purchase in late July. Next steps include updates to the roof and HVAC system, among other improvements. Stop by Aug. 31 to pass along your congratulations to Hamilton and Benevento and jam to Horse Lords, Wume, Smoke Bellow, and DJ/MC Lexie Mountain in the backyard.

New Digs for The Ivy Bookshop

The Ivy is already a book-lover’s dream, but take a moment to imagine perusing one of its tomes while rocking back and forth on a peaceful front porch, or maybe even moving into the shop itself. Those dreams will soon be a reality, as The Ivy plans to move into a 19th century home at 5928 Falls Road this spring. New additions will include more space for books, an upstairs workshop, and a writer’s residency apartment, all inside a charming former church near the Jones Falls.

It’s a Woman’s World at the BMA

The Baltimore Museum of Art has announced on Aug. 1 that, starting this fall, the museum will play host to 20 exhibitions celebrating women and female-identifying artists over the course of a year. The program, called 2020 Vision, recognizes the 100th anniversary of the 19th Amendment and will kick off this fall with By Their Creative Force: American Women Modernists, which will feature 20th-century painters, followed by an installation of Mickalene Thomas’ living rooms in the museum’s east lobby in November. Vision 2020 begins in September and will stretch through Summer 2020.

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.”

Thanks to a $5 million dollar grant, the Ruth R. Marder Center for Matisse Studies will open by 2021—serving as a place of scholarship, study, and community surrounding the artist, who museum director Christopher Bedford calls “one of the two or three most influential figures of the 20th century.” The gift comes from the Ruth Carol Fund, created by Marder, the late Baltimore philanthropist and passionate patron of the arts who was a longtime BMA supporter.

“It’s unprecedented in our history,” Bedord says. “It very deliberately enhances the collection most associated with the greatness of the museum. This has been an aspiration that’s existed in the aether for a very long time.”

The BMA has been known for its extensive collection of Matisse’s works for some time. But Bedford points out that this reputation exists mostly within museum circles. In effect, the BMA serves as an extension for those who already share a keen interest in the artist’s work. With the establishment of the center and the accompanying marketing and press, Bedford hopes that the museum’s most reputable collection will become more accessible to the general public.

“We have the greatest and most comprehensive account of Matisse’s career in any public institution,” Bedford says. “One of the great things about this announcement is our capacity to telegraph that greatness to a far broader constituency than we’ve been able to achieve historically.”

Planning for what exactly the center will comprise of is still in early stages, but Bedford envisions a place where scholars both distinguished and eagle-eyed can gather to learn about and discuss Matisse’s works. Inevitably, he says, the center will be shaped by the interests of those who use it.

What it won’t do, though, is serve as a place of exhibition. The gallery space above its proposed first-floor location already does a more than adequate job of that. That’s not to say that the museum won’t dedicate some of its focus to improving upon its collection of more than 1,200 Matisse works, either. Bedford calls the museum’s collection of the artist’s work the “linchpin” of the museum. Now, when the center is established, it will exist in symbiosis with this collection, creating a place for consideration and discussion.

“The space will be about the production of new ideas as capitalized by Matisse’s unique genius,” Bedford says. “What we’ve really established here is a braintrust for the study of Matisse, his influences, and the influence that he continues to exert on a generation of living artists.”

Baltimore’s landmark Lexington Market, the longest continually running public market in America, currently sees more than one million visitors each year. The food hall has fed the city for nine generations, and now, it’s added art to the menu.

Today marked the official opening of the Baltimore Museum of Art’s (BMA) branch location at Lexington Market. The new gallery space welcomed nearly 120 people to a public opening reception last night, which showcased images from a youth photography program at the Greenmount West Community Center. From photos of flowers to selfies of smiling teenagers, the exhibit showed the community in a whole new light.

In addition, a workshop for young adults was led by New Orleans-based artists Keith Calhoun and Chandra McCormick. The two have worked together for more than 30 years photographing Louisiana and its people.

“We felt extremely strongly that it is not enough to change our public programs and expect people to descend on us,” says Chris Bedford, executive director at the BMA. “Rather we found it important to extend ourselves into the city to engage different communities.”

But this is not the first extension of the museum. Two branch locations were established during World War II and saw more than 55,000 visitors between 1943 and 1948. The Lexington Market space continues to add to that legacy.

“The activation of a stall that had previously sat vacant for a few years with art and programming does wonderful things for the market,” says Stacey Pack, Lexington Market project manager. “Equally exciting is the energy and discussions that take place within this area. This also gives people another reason to either visit the market or linger longer.”

There are a lot of issues to consider with the redevelopment of an institution like Lexington Market. With a lot of residents relying on the Supplemental Nutrition Assistance Program (SNAP), locals are concerned about gentrification and price increases.

According to Dave Eassa, manager of community engagement for the BMA, rotating themes will inspire future programs and activities. In honor of the market where the branch resides, the first topic is food, and it will touch on aspects such as nutrition, access, and local foodways.

“Food was the most prevalent issue when talking with merchants and users of the market,” Eassa says. “Many merchants are losing SNAP and as Seawall is trying to redevelop, everyone is worried about access to fresh, affordable food that they have relied on the market to provide for over 200 years.”

A redevelopment project, Transform Lexington, is currently being planned to include a new market structure and urban plaza. The East Market will remain open throughout the revamp and regular hours at the BMA branch will be from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m., Thursday through Saturday with free admission.

“This location is very unique because it truly is a public space where people from all backgrounds and walks of life gather and visit,” Pack says. “Lexington Market has always been a hub for Baltimore City so this location really is perfect.”

Although the market is going through a transformative period, the BMA branch is expected to remain a part of the space. The inspiration came from another program the museum has run previously called the Outpost, which was essentially a nomadic museum that roamed across Baltimore.

“Those communities were not satisfied with a fleeting engagement, but instead wanted a far more sustained conversation with the BMA,” Bedford says. “[We want to make] it clear that we are the specific museum for the city, that our doors are open to all, that our fundamental mandate is relevant, and that we are willing to go to any lengths to achieve that.”

In the exhibition Hitching Their Dreams to Untamed Stars: Joyce J. Scott and Elizabeth Talford Scott, it’s difficult to determine who influenced who—and even to differentiate, in some instances, which of the nine pieces was done by which artist.

It’s evident, however—in the asymmetrical, mixed-media textile pieces, the rich colors that vibrate with life, and the stories and meaning woven into each piece—that this mother and daughter, who lived and worked together in Baltimore for 60 years, influenced one another deeply.

“People ask, ‘What’d your mom say to you?’ She said to never give up . . . Just follow that dream and never stop. Persevere. Everything is out there for you,” Scott recalls at the Baltimore Museum of Art during a preview of the exhibit, which opens publicly on May 15 and runs through December 1. “That has been the code for my life.”

She’s cloaked in colorful batik and tie-dyed fabric and sitting in a wheelchair, looking regal (she assures everyone in attendance that she’ll be out of said wheelchair and dancing again as soon as her knee is in better shape). “I come from people who couldn’t be who I am right now who opened that door for me to come through, and I’m very proud to be someone who’s carrying this with me.”

Scott learned quilting from her mother (and her mother learned it from her mother), and both primarily create mixed-media fiber art, though Scott, named a MacArthur Fellow in 2016, became more well-known for her sculptural beadwork and jewelry.

Aside from indirect influence, the mother-daughter duo has directly collaborated to create pieces, too. Talford Scott began “Fifty Year Quilt” (not shown in this exhibit) in San Francisco when she was young, for instance, and wherever she traveled, she’d add fabric. When Scott was born, she got to work on that same quilt, adding more stories of places traveled. They also made beadwork and dolls together, sang together, and talked at lectures together before Talford Scott passed away in 2011.

The piece “Face,” made in the 1970s and included in Hitching Their Dreams, was also created by both of them: Scott wove its colorful wool in response to her mother’s storytelling.

Scott has never been known to shy away from controversial imagery and subject matter either. Some of her work is overtly subversive, either artistically or politically or both (think “Inkisi #2,” her mixed-media sculpture of a woman whose large skirt is affixed with, among other items, bright green penises—representing procreation, she explains).

Talford Scott’s “Plantation” is an example of quilts that were made and used as escape routes for African Americans wanting to flee a plantation in the South. Creating something beautiful that represented something else entirely was a lesson taught to Talford Scott by her grandparents—how to hide in plain sight. For instance, a 20-inch row of the fabric in this topographical map might represent a line of cotton or vegetables. The stars that fill its white background represent the stars they would view in the night sky overhead that could be used for navigational purposes, making the piece both whimsical yet practical, artful yet political, comforting yet tense.

Scott says she has a “classic Negro history.” “My mom picked cotton and my father picked tobacco. They were in the Great Migration from the South . . . not only to get jobs that were better, but so that they wouldn’t be harassed by nightriders every night in their communities. And then they had me.”

Her mother and father attended one-room schoolhouses—roughly equivalent to a sixth-grade education today—but that didn’t stop Talford Scott from bringing her young daughter to the BMA, after her family relocated to Baltimore. It didn’t stop her from believing in Scott’s artwork and cheering her on, telling her she could follow her dreams, a reference Scott makes in the show’s title.

Scott lives in Upton, which she admits can be a rough neighborhood, but it’s home. “I don’t believe the change happens by running away from yourself,” she says, “I believe that when you stay in a community, you make a difference.”

People in Scott’s neighborhood call her “Mom,” just as they called Talford Scott, who would make her own wine and sit around and talk and teach people in the neighborhood to make art.

Scott recalls a talk she gave with her mother at the University of Colorado Boulder, where they were invited to speak to a ceramics class. Her mother talked about how she and her family would make pinch pots during the Depression, because you had to make your own pots for everything. And those things that you made could be beautiful. The class listened in awe, mouths agape. Even Scott was impressed, having heard similar stories as a young child but hearing them again provided new context.

Growing up in Sandtown in the ’50s, Scott was surrounded by stories like this—relatives working as sharecroppers or running and hiding from people who were after them or paying people off with bootlegged drink.

“There’s something about living in the 21st century that is very, very different in the United States, more than other parts of the world,” she says. “When my mom and other people of her generation go, that’s it. You can look them up online, you can even hear them talking online, but that thing about sitting next to them, having a shot of Hennessy or something, and hearing her talk.

“That old generation is taking with them their knowledge and secrets of the past that we in the West don’t always even celebrate,” Scott goes on. “But you go to Asia, you go to Africa, you go to Central America, and you meet that exact woman who is just like my mom, who’s still tilling the soil or spinning something with her grandkids, talking about stuff in the exact same way. I think it’s a loss for us, for our speed to be so future-[oriented]. It’s not giving the props to the past that built all of us.”

Visual Art

Hitching Their Dreams to Untamed Stars: Joyce J. Scott & Elizabeth Talford Scott
Joyce J. Scott is a national treasure, but Baltimore gets the joy of claiming her as one of our own. With this new exhibition featuring both the work of Scott and her mother, Elizabeth Talford Scott, visitors to the Baltimore Museum of Art have the chance to experience the decades-long artistic conversation between mother and daughter through quilts, sculpture, and intricate needlework. May 15-Dec. 1. Baltimore Museum of Art, 10 Art Museum Dr.

Mental Health Awareness Month Art Show
Mark the 70th Annual Mental Health Awareness Month by supporting both local artists and the Brain & Behavior Research Foundation at this multi-week art show. Stop by opening night for live painting, poetry readings, glassblowing demonstrations, and live music, then peruse works by the likes of Annie Howe Papercuts, Suburban Avenger Studios, Gilah Press + Design, and more. Opening May 17 at 7 p.m. UNION Craft Brewing, 1700 W. 41st St.

Music

Letitia VanSant + Goodnight Moonshine feat. Molly Venter
Songstress Letitia VanSant’s personal and political lyrics have earned her both local and international acclaim. Don’t miss your chance to hear her powerful, Americana-inspired arrangements alongside lush, folksy tunes from Goodnight Moonshine. May 10 at 8 p.m. Creative Alliance, 3134 Eastern Ave.

Theater

Welcome to Shakesville
Boogie on down to Zion Church for this latest spectacle from Baltimore Rock Opera Society. During the birth of the psychedelia, one girl, Betty, is on a quest to solve the mysterious disappearance of Jimmy Graves in the colorful and crazy world of Shakesville. Travel back to 1965 with this BROS crew during this nod to all things groovy. May 24-June 16. Zion Church of the City of Baltimore, 400 E. Lexington St.

A New Brain
In 1992, award-winning author William Finn suffered a brain seizure shortly after the opening of Falsettos (which he co-wrote with James Lapine) and was hospitalized. The experience inspired this latest Iron Crow Theatre production, the poignant and surprisingly funny story of children’s TV composer Gordon, who dreams of writing a Broadway hit but is blindsided by a life-threatening brain tumor. May 31-June 9. Baltimore Theatre Project, 45 W. Preston St.

Film

Maryland Film Festival
Christmas for cinephiles has come again. The Maryland Film Festival returns for four days and five nights of films, special guests, and great experiences for movie lovers of all stripes. Catch some new documentary screenings, join John Waters to watch a Nicolas Cage rampage, or just pick a time slot and see what’s new with some friends. May 8-12, Various Station North locations

Literature

Meet Matthew A. Cherry and Vashti Harrison
Gather the kids and head to The Children’s Bookstore for this visit and book signing with the author and illustrator of Hair Love. Born from a lack of representation in animated projects and the desire to promote hair love in kids, this sweet father-daughter tale of love and self-acceptance is sure to become a favorite among both children and parents.

Preakness Stakes
May 16-18. 5201 Park Heights Ave. Times and prices vary. When he was a senior in high school, Weston Hamilton decided, practically on a whim, to become a jockey after graduation. The son of Steve “Cowboy” Hamilton, a champion racer, Weston grew up trail riding and looking at pictures of his dad as a “jock,” and he wanted to try it for himself. Fast-forward two years: He’s the country’s leading apprentice and has garnered more than $3 million in purse earnings. Weston says he looks forward to competing during Preakness weekend because it reminds him of the “good ol’ days” of racing, with onlookers dressed to the nines and cheering from the sidelines. “You get butterflies when you see everyone watching you and your horse,” says Weston. “It’s like no other feeling in the world.”—KP

Maryland Film Festival
May 8-12. Time varies. Station North Arts and Entertainment District. $8-450. Baltimore might not be as glamorous as Hollywood, but according to film critic Richard Brody, it becomes the “center of cinematic gravity” each year during this five-day film celebration. Whether you’re a casual moviegoer or a full-blown cinephile, take advantage of this opportunity to watch more than 100 shorts, features (including The Mountain, starring Jeff Goldblum), and documentaries, as well as attend Q&A sessions and workshops with acclaimed filmmakers at the historic Parkway Theatre in Station North.

FlowerMart
May 3-4. 11 a.m. 699 Washington Pl.. Free. This time-honored Mt. Vernon tradition signals the start of the spring with tons of flowers, extravagant hats, and the festival’s signature lemon sticks. Spend the weekend browsing through wares by local arts and crafts vendors, area food trucks, and, of course, flower carts that will decorate the neighborhood during this weekend-long family-friendly affair.

Baltimore Tattoo Convention
May 3-5. Times vary. The Baltimore Convention Center. Free-$40. The Baltimore Convention Center has hosted some eclectic events over the years (think Comic-Con and Bronycon), and this annual convention that brings all walks of life together to celebrate the art of tattooing is no exception. With dozens of tattoo contests, local and regional vendors, seminars, and special guests such as past contestants from the TV show Ink Masters, we can almost guarantee that you’ll leave the downtown center with at least one new tat.

Kinetic Sculpture Race
May 4. 5 p.m. Location varies. Free-$75. Objects typically written off as junk—think used bicycles and gears—are front and center for this human-powered and slightly lunatic sculpture race. During this signature citywide event hosted by the American Visionary Art Museum, try your hand at “engineering” a rideable structure and race around the Inner Harbor for the chance to win outrageous prizes such as the “Grand Mediocre East Coast Champion Award” or cheer on your faves from the sidelines.

An Intimate Evening with Anderson Cooper and Andy Cohen
May 11. 8 p.m. 12 N Eutaw St. $93.50-137.50. Though they typically appear on opposite ends of the TV spectrum—with Anderson Cooper anchoring on CNN and Andy Cohen schmoozing with celebrities on his late-night show Watch What Happens Live—the two stars will team up to interview each other at this one-night-only event at the Hippodrome Theatre. From swapping celebrity gossip to hosting a Q&A session with the audience, experience Cooper and Cohen’s undeniable chemistry and hear embarrassing anecdotes that could only result from a longtime friendship.

RemFest
May 11. 12 p.m.-9 p.m. Remington Ave. and 28th St. Free. Despite the smash-hit success of the first-ever RemFest, Remington-based businesses and neighbors are gunning to make this year’s festival even bigger and better. Along with more than 75 local artisan vendors, family-friendly activities, and libations by Union Craft Brewing and r.bar, the outdoor festival boasts a killer lineup of local acts including Soul Cannon, Super City, and rising banjo player Jacob Panic. Spend the day celebrating this evolving neighborhood and check out top spots like B. Willow and Charmington’s while you’re in the neighborhood.

Hitching Their Dreams to Untamed Stars
May 15-Dec. 1. Time varies. 10 Art Museum Dr. Free. If you do nothing else this spring, visit the Baltimore Museum of Art to experience this awe-inspiring exhibition that celebrates the profound work of MacArthur-award winning local artist Joyce J. Scott and her mother, Elizabeth Talford Scott. The curated collection features Elizabeth’s experimental textile pieces, including a quilt that depicts the North Star as a matriarchal beacon of freedom, along with examples of Joyce’s art that responds to her mother’s textile tradition. The exhibition’s seven-month run encourages visitors to view the pair’s thought-provoking bodies of work again and again.

92Q Spring Bling Festival
May 24. 7:30p.m. 201 W Baltimore St. $110-310. Whether you love her or not, there’s no denying that stripper-turned-rapper Cardi B has taken the world by storm. This month, the Grammy Award-winning queen will grace the Royal Farms Arena to headline 92Q’s annual spring concert, and she’s sure to bring the house down with hits like “Money” and “Be Careful.” Get there early to hear sets by rising rappers including Yo Gotti, Moneybagg Yo, and Blac Youngsta.

Brew at the Zoo
May 25-26. Time varies. 1 Safari Pl. $24.99-75.99. We can’t think of a better way to kick off Memorial Day weekend than hanging out with the Maryland Zoo’s polar bears and penguins while sipping on local brews. In between unlimited samplings of beers from more than 80 breweries, bop along to live music by artists such as Ballyhoo! and Amish Outlaws and soak up the suds with eats from dozens of food vendors. Best of all? Every dollar raised during this annual fundraiser goes directly back to the zoo.

Visual Art

Monsters & Myths: Surrealism and War in the 1930s and 1940s
Constant conflict throughout Europe in the 1930s and 1940s shaped many of the great modern artists. This show focuses on the Surrealists—Salvador Dalí, Pablo Picasso, Max Ernst, and André Masson, among others—and how they interpreted the violence and destruction around them. View masterworks inspired by the Spanish Civil War and World War II in this exhibition of nearly 90 pieces. Opens Feb. 24; on view during museum hours through May 26. Baltimore Museum of Art, 10 Art Museum Dr.

David Driskell: Memories of Romare Bearden
Presented in conjunction with the exhibition Romare Bearden: Visionary Artist, join one of the leading authorities on African-American art for a discussion of Bearden and his impact. David Driskell will present not only his scholarly opinion, but his personal memories of Bearden as both a friend and artist. 1-3 p.m. Feb. 9. Reginald F. Lewis Museum, 830 E. Pratt St.

Music

Fourth Annual Charm City Django Jazz Fest
Celebrate the musical legacy of jazz legend Django Reinhardt over two days at the Creative Alliance. Enjoy workshops and performances from acts such as Baltimore gypsy jazz outfit Ultrafaux and Ellicott City teen guitar star Samuel Farthing, or stop in Saturday evening for a free lecture about the life of the man himself from Siv B. Lie. Times vary Feb. 22-23. Creative Alliance, 3134 Eastern Ave.

Theater

UnPresidented! A Political Variety Show
The most people usually do to celebrate President’s Day is buy a mattress at a discount. Spice up this holiday by heading to Single Carrot Theatre for a cabaret-style night of parody songs, political-themed strip tease, and artful renditions of presidential erotic poetry. Pro tip: Snag a VIP ticket for a front-row seat and open bar privileges. 8 p.m. Feb. 16. Single Carrot Theatre, 2600 N. Howard St.

Film

Docs from the Docks: Trash Dance
When most people see garbage trucks, they don’t think beauty—and that’s if they think of them at all. Choreographer Allison Orr wanted people to see these essential vehicles and the people who work on them in a new light, so she got to work. The result is Trash Dance, a Sundance- and AFI-lauded documentary about Austin’s sanitation workers, their lives, and the one night they came together to dance in front of thousands. Ahead of the screening, enjoy a live dance performed by Baltimore’s own Fluid Movement. Doors at 6:30 p.m., screening at 7 p.m., panel Q&A to follow, Feb. 21. Brown Advisory, 901 S. Bond St.

From Swastika to Jim Crow
Jewish academics who escaped Nazi Germany arrived in the United States to find that antisemitism was rampant on both sides of the Atlantic. Turned away by many major universities, these scholars began teaching at Historically Black Colleges and Universities throughout the South, where they bonded with their students through shared experiences of segregation and discrimination. From Swastika to Jim Crow explores this phenomenon and the ways it shaped both groups. 7-8:30 p.m. Feb. 27. Morgan State University Student Center Theater, 1700 E. Cold Spring Ln.

Dance

Lunar New Year Celebration
Ring in the Year of the Pig with this annual celebration at The Walters Art Museum. Let the kids try out art activities and a Chinese zodiac-themed scavenger hunt through the Arts of Asia, then secure your spot in the Sculpture Court for a performance by the Yong Han Lion Dance Troupe. The colorful dance featuring traditional lion costumes is a spectacle not to be missed. 11 a.m. to 4 p.m. Feb. 10. The Walters Art Museum, 600 N. Charles St.

Literature

Talking About Race: Steve Luxenberg and Judge Robert Bell
Author and Washington Post senior editor Steve Luxenberg will be joined by former chief judge of the Maryland Court of Appeals Robert Bell for this conversation about the lasting impact of Plessy v. Ferguson, the court case that established the “separate but equal” doctrine in the United States. Luxenberg’s new book, Separate: The Story of Plessy v. Ferguson, recounts the case through the eyes of its major figures using letters, diaries, and archives. Copies will be available for sale and signing following the discussion. 7-8:30 p.m. Feb. 13. Church of The Redeemer, 5603 N. Charles St.

News

True Vine Finds a New Home
The True Vine Record Shop has announced that the store will move to a new location in Station North. Golden West Cafe will take over the shop’s former Hampden home, and True Vine is scheduled to reopen in its new space at 1827 N. Charles Street sometime this spring. A GoFundMe to help cover relocation costs has raised nearly $3,000 since being launched Dec. 16.

Looking to add a bit of culture to your afternoon? There is no shortage of great museums around Baltimore. Whether it’s art, science, history, or a particular famous figure you’re interested in, there’s a place nearby to spend your day wandering and learning.

American Visionary Art Museum

This unique museum celebrating outsider art was named by Congress as the country’s official museum for self-taught art. Come for the elaborate sculptures, gorgeous drawings, and interesting assemblage pieces, then stick around to browse Sideshow, the treasure trove of a museum store downstairs. As a bonus, AVAM is free for federal employees (and up to three others) during the 2019 government shutdown with a valid ID.

For more visionary and local art, try: MICA Galleries, Eubie Blake Cultural Center

Baltimore Museum of Art

This free museum houses a collection of 95,000 works, so you’re sure to find something to interest everyone among its vast collection. Lovers of modern art will want to linger in the galleries housing the famed Cone Collection, while those looking for the more non-traditional can usually find something interesting and extraordinary in the Contemporary Wing or special exhibition galleries. Recent shows have included a John Waters retrospective, surreal visions of some of Europe’s great conflicts, and a look back at the BMA’s first exhibit to feature black artists.

For more art and antiques, try: Maryland Art Place, School 33 Art Center

Reginald F. Lewis Museum of Maryland African-American History & Culture

The Smithsonian-affiliated Reginald F. Lewis Museum is home to art, photographs, sculptures, military antiques, and ephemera chronicling Maryland’s African-American history from 1784 to the present. Although it’s connected to the Smithsonian, the Lewis Museum remains open throughout the shutdown and is offering free admission to furloughed workers and up to three guests with a valid government I.D.

For more African-American history and culture, try: Frederick Douglass-Isaac Myers Maritime Park, National Great Blacks in Wax Museum

The Walters Art Museum

Housed across three buildings (including a historic residence) in Mount Vernon, the Walters features an extensive collection of Asian antiquities and decorative arts. Wander the Chamber of Wonders to experience what a 1600s nobleman might have shown off in his lavish home, or head to the 1 West Mount Vernon Place to see contemporary art placed alongside the preserved architecture of a 19th-century townhouse.

For more historic homes and exhibits, try: The Johns Hopkins Museums, The Star-Spangled Banner Flag House

The Baltimore Museum of Industry

Explore Baltimore’s history as a hub of business and industry at this South Baltimore museum housed in a former cannery. Exhibits include a 1900s garment loft, a recreated soda fountain, a print shop, and a gallery dedicated to how Baltimore fueled the rise of the automobile. Don’t forget to stop by the Baltimore docked outside—she’s the oldest steam-powered tugboat in the United States.

For more transportation and industrial history, try: The B&O Railroad Museum, Baltimore Streetcar Museum

Maryland Historical Society

The MdHS is the state’s oldest, continuously operating cultural institution, having been responsible for documenting Maryland history since 1844. With exhibits featuring figures such as The Catonsville Nine, Elizabeth Patterson Bonaparte, and the Peale Family of painters, this collection is comprised of more than seven million items from pre-Colonial times to the present.

For more great figures from Baltimore’s past, try: The Babe Ruth Birthplace & Museum, Edgar Allan Poe House & Museum

Maryland Science Center

With a history going back to 1797 with the Maryland Academy of Sciences, this Inner Harbor spot has evolved into a family-friendly exploration of the natural world, from the smallest cells to history’s largest creatures. Visitors can also take advantage of Davis Planetarium or catch a movie on the IMAX screen, which will reopen in March after theater renovations are complete.

For more hands-on learning, try: Port Discovery Children’s Museum, Historic Ships in Baltimore

National Aquarium

Plan to spend some serious time at this colorful spot. Beyond the normal fish, rays, and other aquatic critters, you’ll find sloths, puffins, crocodiles, and more scattered across the many habitats housed in this multi-level aquarium. An indoor rainforest, a stories-high shark tank, and a living reef featuring Calypso, a rescued sea turtle, are just a few of the highlights in this gem overlooking the Inner Harbor. Book your timed entry ticket online to avoid long lines, and go first thing in the morning or late in the day to avoid the field trip crowd.

For more nature encounters, try: The Maryland Zoo in Baltimore, Rawlings Conservatory

The Baltimore Museum of Art started 2019 with one of the busiest weekends in its history—including a rare “sold out” day—as hundreds lined up to see the John Waters retrospective before it closed.

On Saturday, museum staffers were forced to deny admission to prospective patrons by mid-afternoon, after ticket sales reached capacity for the building’s galleries. The museum stayed open past its regular Saturday operating hours to accommodate the long lines of people who had reservations. Sunday was almost as busy.

The show that drew the crowds was John Waters: Indecent Exposure, an exhibit of visual art created by the Baltimore-based writer, filmmaker and visual artist.

On view since October 7, this was the first retrospective in Baltimore of Waters’ work as a visual artist, and Sunday was the last day of the show. The museum is open for free but charges an admission for certain exhibits, including the Waters retrospective. Ticket prices ranged from $5 for visitors 18 and under to $15 for adults. Not even members could gain admission if they didn’t have a reservation.

On Saturday, demand for tickets was so strong that sales were cut off around 3:30 p.m. Visitors who came to the museum after that were greeted with a sign at the reservations desk stating that the exhibit was sold out and encouraging people to make reservations for Sunday.

“Yesterday was the single busiest day that we had for this exhibit,” even surpassing opening day, said Mercedes Lopez, the museum’s visitor experience manager. In all, 1,294 people saw the show on Saturday, and 1,168 saw it on Sunday, according to the museum’s count. They came from all over Maryland, and an unusually high percentage weren’t museum members, Lopez added.

“People are definitely coming out to see John Waters,” she said. “We had a lot of people who had never been to the museum before, but who had run into John in a bar or saw his Christmas show. It’s always exciting to have first-time visitors.”

Lopez said the last BMA exhibit to have a sold-out day was the Matisse/Dieberkorn show in 2016, featuring the works of Henri Matisse and Richard Diebenkorn. For the John Waters show, the mood was more relaxed and playful, she said.

“We had a lot of unusual outfits, a lot of people dressing up. People came in beehives and as characters from his movies. That was a lot of fun to see the quirkiness of his fans.”

On Sunday, Lopez said, the museum was at capacity from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. but still had some tickets in the afternoon, when the Ravens were playing the Chargers at M&T Bank Stadium.

People standing in line around 4:30 p.m. Saturday had various reasons for waiting to visit the museum. Some said they received the tickets as gifts and that the day and time were chosen in advance. Others said they knew the show was ending and bought the tickets just before sales were cut off.

Liz Fisher said she came from Easton to see the show. “My daughter gave this to me for Christmas,” she said, adding that she is a big fan of Waters. “Better late than never.”

“We’re last-minute Larrys,” admitted Kate Clemmons, who stood at the end of the line with her husband, Brent. She also said they got the tickets as a gift and that they were celebrating an important occasion: “It’s our wedding anniversary.”

Jason Bartholomew said he and his wife Rebecca Klein were near the end of the line because “we have a 5 year old.” Bartholomew said they put off getting tickets because they figured the show “would be there forever,” then realized it was closing on January 6. He said they called for tickets around 3 p.m. on Saturday and apparently got them just before sales ended.

Francis Tucci wasn’t so lucky. She and a friend drove from Howard County to see the show and were told tickets were sold out. She said they stayed to see other exhibits at the museum, including the Cone collection and the Ebony G. Patterson tapestry exhibit in the Berman Textile Gallery.

Tucci speculated that the partial shutdown of the federal government may have contributed to the crowds, because many of the museums in Washington were closed on Saturday. “I’m thinking that because of the shutdown in D. C., a lot of people came here,” she said.

The crowds were good for business at the museum’s gift shop and restaurant Gertrude’s Chesapeake Kitchen, both of which were busy through the weekend. Many in the gift shop were buying Waters-related souvenirs, including framed prints, T-shirts, and tank tops.

Besides triggering a sell-out, the John Waters show was shaping up to be BMA exhibit with the highest attendance in 2018, according to the museum’s senior director of communications, Anne Mannix-Brown, who said the Waters show was likely to be the “highest attended” for the year, although not the highest in museum history.

Those who missed Indecent Exposure during its Baltimore run still have a chance to see it if they are willing to travel. The exhibit opens at the Wexner Center for the Arts in Columbus, Ohio, on February 2 and runs through April 28.

Visual Art

Artesanas Mexicanas y Artesanitos
Don’t miss your chance to view and purchase handmade piñatas, corn husk flowers, and traditional embroidery from the talented women of Creative Alliance’s Artesanas Mexicanas program and their child apprentices, who are part of a year-long program to learn these intricate arts. Stop by opening night for a reception that will include a traditional Mexican dinner and performances. Reception from 6-8 p.m. Nov. 16; On view from Nov. 16 to Dec. 1. Amalie Rothschild Gallery at Creative Alliance, 3134 Eastern Ave.

Baltimore Beneath the Surface
This exhibit pairing Baltimore-based street photographers Lashelle Bynum and Angelia Carter has been extended through the end of November, meaning there’s no reason to miss this series of portraits of the city and its people. Covering both individuals’ stories and the communities that surround them, these images offer a look at the many pieces that create the whole of Baltimore. On view through Nov. 30. Eubie Blake Cultural Center, 847 N. Howard St.

Lizzie Fitch/Ryan Trecartin
Longtime collaborators Lizzie Fitch and Ryan Trecartin have shown their videos, sculptures, and installations around the world, and their latest stop at the BMA brings all those elements into the museum’s hallowed halls. Venture into either of the sculptural theaters (one made to look like a bar and the other a sort of gymnastics center) to view films exploring the ideas of technology, identity, and communication in the 21st century. On view through Jan. 6, 2019. The Baltimore Museum of Art, 10 Art Museum Dr.

Music

The Art of Prelude and Fugue
This brand-new concert series from the Peabody Institute pairs Russian composer Dmitry Shostakovich’s book of Preludes and Fugues with the Baroque Bach compositions that inspired it. Join pianist Lura Johnson at the intimate Leith Symington Griswold Hall for the first of four explorations of these two composers and how their pieces, created 200 years apart, can work together. Pre-concert lecture at 6:30, Concert at 7:30, Nov. 19. Leith Symington Griswold Hall, 1 E. Mount Vernon Pl.

Joy Postell Album Release Show at the Ottobar
Local indie R&B artist Joy Postell has had a big year, and she’s closing it out with a bang. New music, new videos, and a mention in The New York Times’ piece “The Changing Sound of Baltimore” have all created buzz around the local singer, and now her debut album, Diaspora, is finally here. Get in line early to catch this free performance to celebrate the release. Doors at 8 p.m., Show at 9 p.m., Nov. 23. Ottobar, 2549 N. Howard St.

Theater

A Wonder in My Soul
In a story that feels rooted firmly in the world around us, two Baltimore beauty shop owners must weigh their love of their neighborhood against moving away from the pressures of crime and the rising cost of gentrification. Friendship and community anchor this work from celebrated playwright Marcus Gardley. Nov. 29 through Dec. 23. Baltimore Center Stage, 700 N. Calvert St.

Drunk Classics: Shakespeare
Watch as the cast at Single Carrot and their guests deliver their tipsy interpretations of some of the Bard’s greatest scenes. Enjoy a live Drunk History-style biography of Shakespeare to start, and then who knows what the night will bring? A blitzed Benedick and Beatrice? A plastered Puck? An intoxicated Iago? Only the Carrots know what’s coming. 8-11 p.m., Nov. 17. Single Carrot Theatre, 2600 N. Howard St.

Film

Baltimore’s Strange Fruit Film Screening & Celebration
Celebrate the Black Yield Institute’s third anniversary this screening of the group’s documentary, Baltimore’s Strange Fruit: A Story of Food Apartheid and the Struggle for Sovereignty at the BMA. The event, which will also include entertainment and and a discussion with the filmmakers, will benefit the BYI’s food sovereignty work throughout the city. 3-6 p.m., Nov. 17. The Baltimore Museum of Art, 10 Art Museum Dr.

Literary Arts

Writers LIVE: Antero Pietila
Antero Pietila’s new book, The Ghosts of Johns Hopkins, may not include any spirits. But the ghosts examined in these pages are still haunting the city nearly 150 after the death of the Baltimore titan. Join Pietila to discuss the complicated legacy of Johns Hopkins and how his institutions helped shape the problems of the city we live in today. 7 p.m., Nov. 28. Church of the Redeemer, 5603 N. Charles St.

Festival of Jewish Literature
Catch the final weekend of this two-week celebration of Jewish literature throughout the Baltimore area. Head to Beth El in Pikesville Thursday night for a community reading with Eternal Life author Dara Horn, take in a Jewish Variety Hour Saturday night at The Ivy Bookshop, or bring the kids to a series of children’s programs at Chizuk Amuno Congregation on Sunday evening. Through Nov. 18, Times and locations vary.

No one better represents Baltimore’s fringe arts scene than living icon John Waters. From putting his hometown and its off-beat characters on the big screen in Hairspray to sparking the city’s affection for kitschy plastic flamingos and drag queen Divine in Pink Flamingos, his five-decade arts career continues to this day—and his eccentricity does, too.

On October 7, the Baltimore Museum of Art will unveil John Waters: Indecent Exposure, a retrospective of his work dating back to the 1990s, featuring more than 160 photos, video clips, early films, photocopied drawings, sculptures, and assorted ephemera (like archival photos of John with Andy Warhol and the framed Joan Miró reproduction he bought at the BMA Shop when he was a child). We asked him to reflect on some of his favorites from the upcoming salon-style exhibit.

You’ve lived in Baltimore all your life, you’ve been exhibiting in the U.S. and abroad for some 20 years—why are you just now doing this massive exhibit in your hometown?
I think it’s the right time for me to come home and have a show at the Baltimore Museum [of Art]. I couldn’t have the first one there because people would’ve just said, “Oh, that’s just because he lives in Baltimore.” I had to go out in the rest of the world and build 20 years of exhibitions and museum shows and books. Now that I’ve done that, I think Baltimore is the perfect homecoming. It’s where I got my first taste for the love of how art can infuriate people.

Baltimore is so prominent in all your films. It’s not obvious to a viewer whether it’s prominent in your visual art as well. Is it?
No. It’s the only thing I do that has very little to do with Baltimore. Not completely. My studio is there. My art assistants are there. I have a piece about Mr. Ray, who was one of the most notorious hairdo lunatics on the radio in Baltimore for decades, that I idolized—and he was horrified that I liked him [laughs].

What is it about Baltimore that’s kept you here?
Everything—the sense of humor and the extreme style. Everything I wrote about, everything that informed me was always about taking what some people think is a negative thing and exaggerating it, turning it into a style, and having a sense of humor about it. Baltimoreans have always done that. I like living there now more than I ever did because it’s the only place left that has a bohemia. It’s gotten more expensive, but it’s still cheaper than anywhere else. And kids can still live there and start, you know, bohemia! And the music scene there, the people who have had national success—they stayed. They bought houses. I think that’s very, very important, to stay in Baltimore.

You see that happening with the younger generations of artists?
Yes, I do. I see musicians and artists that grew up in Baltimore didn’t leave when they got success, and students that came here decided to stay. That’s all kind of new and good. You don’t have to leave Baltimore anymore to have success. You might have to have people outside of Baltimore like [your work], but you don’t have to leave.

So getting back to your exhibit—I understand that you take photos of TV screens and rearrange them to create a new narrative.
Yes, most of the work is like that. This show is really about editing. I take images from other people’s movies and put them in a completely different context, often with other movies and scenes, and tell a story that you read from left to write. So it’s about writing and editing.

All your career has been about that, right?
Yeah, you know, I write all my movies, I write all my books. I’ve never made a movie I didn’t write. This is just telling a story in a different way—in the art world rather than in a movie or onstage when I speak. It’s about telling a story and celebrating the failure of show business that really all the movie stills would be rejected from real publicity campaigns. They show what you can’t show.

I show the tape marks that the actors have to hit to stay in focus—but I don’t show the actors or costumes. I show things that go wrong like hair that gets stuck in the gate and ruins a scene. I just show everything that could go wrong and celebrate the failure of show business and the art world, hopefully in a humorous way, because I love everything I make fun.

Well and you’ve lived it—you’ve probably experienced firsthand pretty much everything that could go wrong on set.
Yes, I have, probably [laughs]. And I’ve experienced a lot that went right, too. And sometimes when something goes wrong, it is right in the arts world once it is isolated and put in a different completely showcase what is wrong is right. Like my commercially shot movies don’t work in the art world when I use them for imagery. The worst shot ones work the best.

So you’re using images from your movies as well other filmmakers’.
Once in a while, yes, but just one second of a movie—one second that proves no movies are bad. Because there’s 24 frames a second, and somehow you can find one frame out of 24 in a 90-minute movie that’s good.

Do you truly believe that no movie is bad?
I’m saying if you have access to every frame in a movie, no movie is all bad. You can find one great frame and celebrate it—out of context, stolen, isolated, hidden, put in the wrong projector, the wrong theater, the wrong book for the wrong audience, then it’s good.

I wanted to talk about this photograph called “Divine in Ecstasy.” What were you thinking when you captured that?
I was looking for a still that I didn’t have. I wanted that still. It’s the most ludicrous part of the film [Multiple Maniacs], where Divine is attacked and raped by a transgender man and an insane woman. It’s probably is the most sacrilegious scene to ever be filmed. I never had a still because we were always worried the police were gonna come and get us. We’d been arrested for making a movie before that, Mondo Trasho, so we’d jump out, do a scene, and run! So I just put an old VHS on the TV, and I just kept shooting like a crazed fan in the dark. And then I saw it and thought, oh God—this looks even artier than I could ever imagine. So that’s how I started doing this. Stills are what everyone remember from movies. I always knew how important they were. Even when I had no budget, I had stills.

Why is this photo considered your first official visual art piece?
I never say the word “art.” When people say to me, “I’m an artist,” I secretly think, “I’ll be the judge of that.” Someone else can call me an artist; I’m not calling myself an artist. I think that is up to others and history to call you an artist. But it was my first photograph that was ever shown in an art gallery.

Well, assuming what you’re exhibiting is art, do you see your work as pop art or conceptual art or what would you classify it as?
I think it is conceptual, if I had to name it. I think it all up before I do it. and then I have to go find the images to write with, to edit with, to make that concept come through. The whole idea behind the show is, can art be funny? It’s always been witty, but can it be funny? To me, it can be. But we’ll see.

John Picks His Favorites

Beverly Hills John. 2012. Rubell Family Collection, Miami. © John Waters, Courtesy Marianne Boesky Gallery

“I always say L.A. is just one big York Road. To me, eventually everyone is gonna look the same in L.A. There’s only so many kinds of faces you can get.”

Congratulations. 2014. Collection of Brenda Richardson. © John Waters, Courtesy Marianne Boesky Gallery
“Congratulations is code. When your gallery calls you and says, ‘congratulations,’ you know that you sold something. When you’re a collector and you say, ‘I want it,’ the art dealer will say, ‘congratulations’—which to me is so ludicrous. Many galleries leave the price list out with red dots on [the pieces] when they’re sold. I told the story of the worst thing that can happen in the medium that is the best thing that can happen.”

Divine in Ecstasy. 1992. Collection of Amy and Zachary Lehman. © John Waters, Courtesy Marianne Boesky Gallery
“I wanted that still. It’s the most ludicrous part of the film [Multiple Maniacs], where Divine is attacked and raped by a transgender man and an insane woman. So I just put an old VHS on the TV, and I just kept shooting like a crazed fan in the dark. And then I saw it and thought, oh God——this looks even artier than I could ever imagine. So that’s how I started doing this. It was my first photograph that was ever shown in an art gallery.”

Loser Gift Basket. 2006. Courtesy of the Artist and Marianne Boesky Gallery, New York. © John Waters
“I’m trying to imagine and celebrate everything that can go wrong in show business. Everybody used to give away gift baskets. If you went to the Oscars as a presenter, you’d get cars and stuff. You’d get amazing stuff. But then they started taxing you. It ruined—overnight—the gift bag business. This was my idea of what could be the worst gift basket if you lost the Oscars.”

Baltimore just got gifted with its own little (and in some ways massive) slice of the Venice Biennale.

Artist Mark Bradford, who represented the U.S. in the 2017 Venice Biennale, has deconstructed and reinstalled several of his pieces that were exhibited there to create a new iteration of the exhibition at the Baltimore Museum of Art. Mark Bradford: Tomorrow Is Another Day will be on view from September 23 through March 3, 2019.

On Saturday afternoon, as part of a four-hour Community Celebration at the BMA, Bradford will be in conversation with BMA director Christopher Bedford and senior curator Katy Siegel, who co-curated the exhibition here and in Venice. Guests can preview the show before its official opening on Sunday.

In his work and in talking about it, Bradford doesn’t shy away from confronting the complexities he’s experienced while navigating the world as a black man, a gay man, and a tall man (at 6-foot-8, he says he’s constantly aware of his physical body and how it relates to its environment and other people). Through large abstract mixed-media pieces, sculpture, and video, he processes his experiences within the framework of society and its various communities and cultures—especially those that have been marginalized. He often works with found materials, like dyed hair endpapers, that speak to these communities.

Some highlights in the show include the huge, gnarly sculpture Medusa—made from paint, paper, rope, and caulk and reminiscent of Medusa’s snake-like locks but in this case a commentary of sorts on empowered, self-righteous women; the large and solemn pieces made from repetitive rows of the aforementioned endpapers from a hair salon, which achieve a calm, meditative quality and have a tactile, water-like depth; the emotive trilogy of “Cosmic Paintings,” as the BMA describes them, that includes the show’s striking title piece; and his Spoiled Foot installation, which starts off the show and is constructed of canvas, lumber, cut-up road maps, used roofing material, and what Bradford calls merchant posters—signage collected from in-crisis communities that advertise things like “We Pay Cash for Homes,” 24-hour child care, and bed bugs extermination.

That piece hits on Bradford’s overarching theme of expulsion and how to navigate it. People can’t physically get to the center of the gallery where Spoiled Foot is installed because the piece stretches wall to wall and covers the ceiling, obstructing the space—a tangible representation of people who are, or feel they are, cast out of a particular community. Viewers move through that space much in that same way but in a literal, physical sense—ducking and dodging, conscious of the narrow space in which they have to walk through to get to the next gallery.

As Bradford puts it, “The center is not always available to everyone. . . . I wanted people to feel how it feels.”

This of course raises questions: Who owns the “center”? Who can occupy it?

“I became really fascinated by place,” he says.

Following that line of thought, context changes when a show is installed on the other side of the world.

“Bringing it to a city that’s predominately African American—it definitely changes it,” Bradford said on Thursday. “I think it reinvigorates some of the ideas.”

Roughly 380,000 people attended the 2017 Venice Biennale (the largest crowd at the event to date), but Bradford, as well as Bedford and others on the BMA staff, says he thinks the show looks even better here, and he’s excited that it will be interpreted—or misinterpreted—differently here because of its new geographic location.

He’ll present a slideshow during his talk on Saturday, which is something he’s never done. He says he’s doing it specifically because he’s interested in engaging with the Baltimore audience.

While in Baltimore, he’s spent time with the Greenmount West Community Center, a community art space for children and their families. He’s also spearheaded its Greenmount West Power Press program, which allows kids to learn how to screen print. Tote bags and other items are available to purchase at a popup shop at the BMA to help support GWCC.

As Bedford put it, Bradford has one foot firmly planted in the studio and another in the community. He’s known for his passionate care in creating inclusive, safe spaces for youth.

In Venice, he began a partnership with the nonprofit Rio Terà dei Pensieri called called Process Collettivo, which provided inmates the opportunity to create artisanal products to sell and ultimately help with their reintegration upon being released.

In L.A., where he is based, he cofounded Art + Practice, a contemporary art gallery open to the public that doubles as an educational space for youth to develop skills and gain access to housing and employment opportunities.

In some cases, trying to bring people to a museum is backwards, he says. “I think we have to go there. How about us going there and feeling a little bit uncomfortable.”

When speaking about his time at GWCC, he says, “That’s where the hope comes in. You give the kids a safe space and allow them to be them. The world’s gonna be fine,” he adds, not sarcastically. “We just have to do more and more and more of this.”

He goes on to tell the story about his debilitating childhood fear of the dark. He’d look out his window at night at the moon and tell himself a story: that God poked a hole through the sky, and that’s the little window of light shining through, reminding us that the light is still there—that tomorrow is another day.

Last Wednesday, hordes of art lovers gathered on the sidewalk of Art Museum Drive to take in the illumination of Tavares Strachan’s exhibit In Broad Daylight. Above the grand columns and staircase of the Baltimore Museum of Art, the orange letters came to life in front of everyone’s eyes. And, thanks to social media, everyone following along at home also had a front row seat.

Not only has social media been great for promotion and education, but it’s also redefining how the art world operates.

“It gives everyone equal access digitally to get their work out there and to get the word out about what they’re doing,” said Andrea Boston, the social media manager for the BMA. “I use social media to share facts about an artist or to share the history behind the work of art. It creates this experience with art and what’s going on behind the doors in real-time.”

Aside from artists using it to sidestep galleries to make a name for themselves, social media also makes it easier to sell their work. Boston says that she’s actually purchased prints from artists through Instagram and notices that some even forego professional websites for Facebook and Instagram accounts instead.

“Social media requires strong imagery and a compelling message, which is perfect for art,” she said. “Particularly Instagram, which is a platform that is pretty much designed for beautiful, well-curated photos. That’s the perfect soil for artists to grow a following.”

For local visual artist Hoesy Corona, he believes that social media is a game changer for the art world. By opening up the possibilities that were once limited to reach potential audiences, it’s helped him to establish his brand on his own terms.

“I tend to use it as a professional extension of my studio practice—a virtual marketing assistant of sorts,” he says. “I can give both insight into my studio process, as well as keep my audience informed about my goings-on.”

Strachan himself has a complicated relationship with social media. While he believes that it’s beneficial to his craft, he also knows it’s hard to escape. As an artist, he has to make sure that his work remains the most important thing.

“The art world and being an artist has become kind of global I think,” he says. “It allows for us to stay connected.”

Corona shares a similar philosophy about the influence of social media and believes that it will only continue to help open the doors for artists and patrons alike.

“Just a handful of years ago, artists were limited by the ways in which they could reach potential audiences and had to rely on discriminating middlepersons to sell their goods or gain access to show their work,” he explains. “Social media gives artists plenty of exposure without the help of predatory arts professionals which allows smaller independent artist run spaces to carve a niche for themselves and build a wider audience.”

The BMA has seen that happen quite literally. In just one year, their Instagram followers have grown from 8,000 to nearly 17,000 due to what Boston describes as “growing interest in the dope things the museum has been doing.” By using Instagram and other social media channels to share what’s new or coming soon, they have been able to draw in more visitors than they would have a decade ago.

“Our numbers show it,” she says. “It creates this immediacy and accessibility that we didn’t have before. It opens this portal to art and discovery that may have felt exclusive or roped off in the past.”