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BmoreArt’s Picks: Baltimore Art Galleries, Openings, and Events February 21 – 27

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Living Muses

BmoreArt’s Picks presents the best weekly art openings, events, and performances happening in Baltimore and surrounding areas. For a more comprehensive perspective, check the BmoreArt Calendar page, which includes ongoing exhibits and performances, and is updated on a daily basis.

To submit your calendar event, email us at [email protected]!

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<><><><><><><><><><><>SocEnt Breakfast #29
Wednesday, February 22nd : 7:30-9am

Impact Hub
10 East North Avenue : 21218

SocEnt Breakfast is a forum and platform for idea sharing, resource exchange and connecting among Baltimore’s social entrepreneurs, nonprofit and civic leaders, community advocates, grant-makers, and mission investors.

In this installment (#29), we are excited to hear from Social Innovation Lab–an accelerator program for social ventures in Baltimore.

Housed at Johns Hopkins University, Social Innovation Lab’s mission is to accelerate ventures that create change and opportunity in Baltimore and beyond. Open to anyone in the Baltimore area, SIL annually selects ten ventures for the program and provides funding, office space, workshops, mentorship and coaching to help early-stage ventures meet milestones and make a measurable impact. Since 2011, SIL has supported 62 ventures which have gone on to raise more than $13M, hire 291 individuals in paid roles, and impact the lives of more than 268,000 people in Baltimore and around the world.

The discussion will cover:

<><><><><><><><><><><>Breaking the Words: A Journey of Calligraphy
Wednesday, February 22nd : 7-9pm

Peabody Library
17 East Mount Vernon Place : 21202

<><><><><><><><><><><>Katie Kitamura: A Separation :: Book Reading
Thursday, February 23rd : 7pm

The Ivy Bookshop
6080 Falls Road : 21209

Told in exquisite prose, with intoxicating emotional velocity, A Separation tells the story of a marriage’s end, the gulf that divides us from the inner lives of others and the narratives we invent to mask our true selves.  The novel evokes the psychologically taut atmosphere of a Patricia Highsmith story with the spellbinding stylings of an Elena Ferrante, while its watchful examination of the intimacies and betrayals of a marriage conjures Lauren Groff.  And yet, there’s “a sweet coldness here that is all Kitamura’s” (Financial Times).  A Separation is a riveting stylistic masterpiece of absence and presence, secrets and lies, that leaves the reader transformed.

Katie Kitamura is the author of Gone to the Forest and The Longshot, both of which were finalists for the New York Public Library’s Young Lions Fiction Award. A recipient of a Lannan Residency Fellowship, Kitamura has written for The New York TimesThe GuardianGranta, BOMB, Triple Canopy and is a regular contributor to Frieze. She lives in New York City.

<><><><><><><><><><><>Relate Ruminate Root
Friday, February 24th and Saturday, February 25th : 8pm

Church on the Square
1025 South Potomac Street : 21224

Relate. Ruminate. Root.
By Triptych: Image. Movement. Sound.

An interdisciplinary evening exploring cycles of relationality, rumination, and rooting
February 24th and 25th
7:30 PM doors, 8 PM show
Church on the Square
1025 S Potomac Street
Baltimore, MD
$10 at the door

You are spinning your wheels. Can another be a mirror for change? How does one find themselves and their truth? Can lines be blurred, identities adopted?

In the sanctuary of a community church, Triptych presents the audience with a collaborative and interdisciplinary evening exploring cycles of relationality, rumination, and rooting.

Triptych artists include: Hannah Friedland, Clarissa Gregory, Jenny Ngidi-Brown, Lynne Price, Erin Reid, and Christine Stiver

<><><><><><><><><><><>Out of This World: A Pop Culture and Natural History Print Remix by Chris Mona :: Opening Reception
Friday, February 24th : 5:30-7:30pm

Bromo Arts Tower
21 South Eutaw Street : 21201

The Bromo Seltzer Arts Tower presents a new exhibit: “Out Of This World: A Pop Culture and Natural History Print Remix” by Chris Mona in the First Floor and Mezzanine Galleries. The exhibit is on view Saturdays fromFebruary 25 through July 1, 2017 from 11am to 4pm. A free opening reception will take place Friday, February 24, 2017 from 5:30 to 7:30pm where guests have the opportunity to view the exhibition, meet the artist and enjoy light refreshments. The Bromo Seltzer Arts Tower is managed by the Baltimore Office of Promotion & The Arts and is located at 21 S. Eutaw Street.

Each lithograph, screen print, or intaglio print in Out Of This World depicts a powerful woman–often a comedienne or an actress–moving amongst an inhospitable landscape. Chris Mona’s prints are equal parts thoughtful research and feral disregard. He investigates the elasticity of time, as figures marked by their era–Colonial Virginia to Powerhouse 1980’s–are transported to settings in other trajectories of time and space–deep-time Earth to sulfuric Venus. In one print, swinging 60s model Peggy Moffitt dances in a billowing couture dress on a comet nucleus recently visited by a European space probe; in another, actress Miranda Hart lounges in a Devonian Era landscape populated by earth’s first land plants.

<><><><><><><><><><><>MA Teaching Grad Show 2017 :: Opening Reception
Friday, February 24th : 5-7pm

Fred Lazarus IV Center
131 West North Avenue : 21201

An exhibition of work by graduating MA Teaching students. Part of MICA Grad Show 2017, a city-wide exhibition of work by more than 150 graduating students from the College’s 16 MFA, MA and Post-Baccalaureate programs, with film screenings, gallery talks and presentations, public programs, a symposium and student-curated installations.
Friday, February 24 – Sunday, March 12

<><><><><><><><><><><>The White Snake :: Opening Weekend
Friday, February 24th – March 26th

Center Stage
700 North Calvert Street : 21202

Mystery and magic intertwine in this fantastical fairy tale brought to life in grand spectacle in the newly renovated Head Theater. Originating from the ancient Chinese fable, The White Snake tells the story of animal spirits White Snake and Green Snake, who take human form as a beautiful woman and her sly servant. White Snake soon falls passionately in love with a poor fisherman, but their relationship is reviled by a conservative monk and tragedy lurks behind their newfound happiness. Complemented by storytelling techniques traditional and new, The White Snake will be a can’t-miss event of the 2016/17 Season for the entire family.

This magical fairytale based on a classic Chinese fable is well-suited for middle schoolers and older elementary school students who don’t mind special effects and the length of a full theatrical production.

“Zimmerman doesn’t simply fashion engrossing plays; she creates theatrical magic.”—Huffington Post

<><><><><><><><><><><>American Craft Show :: Baltimore 2017
Friday, February 24th – Sunday, February 26th

Baltimore Convention Center
1 West Pratt Street : 21201

Join us for three days of festivities celebrating all things handmade! More than 650 top contemporary jewelry, clothing, furniture, and home décor artists from across the country will gather under one roof. It’s your chance to touch, feel, and explore high-quality American craft and meet the makers behind the fabulous work. This is the American Craft Council’s flagship show – a must-attend for craft lovers.

IT’S NOT JUST ABOUT SHOPPING!
• Love fashion? Don’t miss programming in the Style Slam booth where professional stylists show how handmade pieces are the perfect fit for any fashion-conscious wardrobe..
• Get an up-close look at the creative process of top artisans and industry experts at our experiential Let’s Make Inspiration Stations. Fun for the whole family!
• See craft in context at our home décor exhibition “Make Room: Modern Design Meets Craft.” This year’s theme is “In Space and Time.” Designers will create craft-inspired room vignettes inspired by different eras.
• Meet the 20 talented Scottish makers joining us to exhibit their work through our exciting partnership with Craft Scotland.

SHOW DATES AND HOURS
Friday, February 24: 10 a.m. – 8 p.m.
Saturday, February 25: 10 a.m. – 6 p.m.
Sunday, February 26: 11 a.m. – 5 p.m.

ADVANCE TICKETS
Save time and money by purchasing your tickets online. Just click, print your tickets, and present them at the show door. It’s that easy!
$14 one-day pass
$34 three-day pass

ON-SITE ADMISSION
$16 one-day pass
$36 three-day pass
FREE for American Craft Council members and children 12 and under
Join the ACC and get in free!
(TICKETS ARE NON-REFUNDABLE.)

SPECIAL FRIDAY EVENING ADMISSION
Get into the show for just $5 after 5 p.m. Sorry, no other discounts apply.

<><><><><><><><><><><>Questioning Power :: Opening Reception + Artist Talk + Performances
Saturday, February 25th : 7-9pm Reception + Talks / 9-11pm Rhizome DC

VisArts
155 Gibbs Street : Rockville

Antoine Williams: gods in the gaps, Gibbs Street Gallery, February 24 – March 26, 2017

Esteban Del Valle: Unsettled, Kaplan Gallery, February 24 – March 26, 2017

Estefaní Mercedes: 1,000 Yellow Dahlias, Common Ground Gallery, February 17 – March 19, 2017

Shané K. Gooding: To See or Not to See, Concourse Gallery, February 17 – March 19, 2017

Reception and Artist Talks: Friday, February 247 – 9 PM

All Galleries (1st and 2nd floor)

Performances: Friday, February 247 – 9 PM

Artist Concourse and Studios

Heloisa Escudero, Everyone is a VIP, 7 – 9 PM

Sandra Atkinson, Etched8:45 PM

Light Switch Dance Theatre Trio, Luscious/Insanity

Rhizome DC in partnership with VisArts: Friday, February 249 – 11 PM

In(Site) Project Space (2nd floor)

Featuring: Keir Nueringer, Creative Music Workshop Players

Tickets: $10.00 online at https://www.visartsatrockville.org/more/?p=2192493 or $15.00 at the door.

Exhibitions and events are always free and open to the public except when noted. $5.00 suggested donation.

<><><><><><><><><><><>elements ~ five transfigurations for cello and computer
Saturday, February 25th : 8pm

UMBC Earl and Darielle Linehan Concert Hall
UMBC : Catonsville

Cellist Tobias Werner performs elements, an evening-length work by composer Steve Antosca, in collaboration with William Brent.

elements ~ five transfigurations for cello and computer was commissioned by the Fromm Music Foundation at Harvard University. elements was composed for and is dedicated to cellist Tobias Werner, and explores aspects of extended techniques and performance gestures, timbre, sonic characteristics and computer processing for the cello. William Brent developed the technology for elements in close collaboration with the composer.

The blending and spatialization of sonorities in elements forms a vibrant sonic environment where evolving textures emerge from this delicate interaction between performer and computer. The result produces varying sonic combinations, and creates intense effects where the cello at times is immersed in the processed sounds, and at times the processing fades as the cello reveals its core sonic image. The initial idea behind composing elements was to create a score that blended the extended performance techniques of the cello with real-time computer processing to form a unified sonic signature. These extended techniques and computer processes unify the instrument and computer into a sound environment where they eventually become “essentially equal.” But are never really the same.

<><><><><><><><><><><>Red Prairie Press Open Studio + Closing Sale
Saturday, February 25th : 11am-4pm

Red Prairie Press Studio
3500 Parkdale Avenue : 21211

After 11 years, owner Rachel Bone is paring down Red Prairie Press to focus on other things. Come help celebrate/mourn the conclusion of a joyful decade of screen printing and shop at insane discounts! There will be Dresses, Tshirts, Longsleeves, Scarves, Headbands and more on sale. Snacks to get you through this tough time. And signs to help you find my studio – which FedEx still can’t find.

Bone will also be selling off LOTS of craft fair equipment and screen printing equipment! If you are interested, let Rachel know, and she can send you a list of what I have.

“I love you all. I love Baltimore. I will continue making things here, and promoting things made here. I’m excited to do more of both!” – Rachel Bone

<><><><><><><><><><><>7th Annual Johns Hopkins Black History Month Student Competition
Saturday, February 25th : 12-2pm

The Creative Alliance
3134 Eastern Avenue : 21224

In collaboration with Johns Hopkins, the Creative Alliance hosts a Black History Month Competition featuring works by East Baltimore public school students.  Students from kindergarten through twelfth grades create mixed-media works to depict the history of African Americans specific to Baltimore City.

<><><><><><><><><><><>ROYGBIV: Celebrating 7 Colorful Years! :: Opening Reception
Saturday, February 25th : 1-4pm

Make Studio
3326 Keswick Road : 21211

Our 7th anniversary exhibition showcases a special selection of new works by Make Studio’s diverse roster of program artists.

Encompassing all colors of the spectrum, and ranging from watercolors of fantastic landscapes to celebrity tribute portraits to mixed media sculptures inspired by 70s TV shows — as usual, our “birthday show” has something for everyone!

Please join us for music and refreshments at our free opening reception. Saturday February 25 from 1-4pm

<><><><><><><><><><><>Small Foods Part
Saturday, February 25th : 6:30-11:30pm

American Visionary Art Museum
800 Key Highway : 21230

Competitors: $5.00 | Non-Competitors $10.00

AVAM Members compete for free

Proceeds benefit Moveable Feast

Join us for Baltimore’s best and only celebration of the delicious world of petite edibles, the annual Small Foods Party and contest, returning for its 12th year on Saturday, February 25, 2017. The event will be hosted by last year’s grand-prize winners, Barbara Wilgus and Peggy Hoffman. This year, Small Foods takes place at the American Visionary Art Museum, to coincide with their year-long exhibition, YUMMM: The History, Fantasy, and Future of Food. 

The party-cum-competition began in 2006 as a casual hors d’oeuvres gathering of a few friends, including Baltimore artists Melissa Webb, Kelley Bell, Kristin Anchor, and Edward Knapp, near the Christmas holidays. Over time, the food, once bite-sized, became smaller and smaller and the obsessive/competitive nature of the small group of friends gave rise to an event that grew bigger and bigger, requiring a shift to a larger venue. Annual entries increased as the event was opened to the public, and the scope of the event grew to include categories like the Golden Toothpick – the best miniaturization of a food, and the Blue Plate Special – the best meal in miniature. There are now five categories, the winners of which compete for the Grand Prize, a giant can of miniature corn.

​Notable past grand prize winners have included ‘Crappy Meals’, an assembly line-type performative entry in which apron-clad ‘employees’ distributed tiny red and yellow printed boxes filled with French fries, burgers, along with a soda cup, complete with straw and lid, as well as a tiny, simply-prepared and executed (and oh-so-delicious) pulled pork sandwich, served on fingernail-sized freshly baked biscuits.

<><><><><><><><><><><>Becoming: A Living Altar
Saturday, February 25th : 2:30-4:30pm

Baltimore Museum of Art
10 Art Museum Drive : 21218

Celebrate the beauty of Black LGBTQ people with Rooted Collective through movement, music, and poetry. The Rooted Collective is a gathering of Black LGBTQ people who define, dream, and expand on the ways in which we heal from oppression and practice joy and pleasure.

There will be musical performances by QueenEarth and JPope, poetry readings by Kenneth and Monica, as well as a dance performance by Key’asia.

For more information or to register, call 443-573-1836 or email [email protected].

Queer Interiors is a collaboration between artists Rahne Alexander and Jaimes Mayhew with the LGBT Health Resource Center at Chase Brexton.

<><><><><><><><><><><>Open Exchange: Creating Art at a Time of Crisis
Saturday, February 25th : 2-4pm

The Reinstitute
1715 North Calvert Street : 21202

Zoë Charlton | Tim Doud | Aaron Williams

What are the limits of Art in times of crisis? Much of the Artist’s cultural efforts have shaped the cities and cultural communities we love, yet artists even more now than ever face the greatest challenge – the realization of their efforts.   Is it not enough to just have an art practice that is interdisciplinary while striving for personal success?  As the world comes to terms with the bludgeoning reality of intolerance as current political will, many Artists face the hardship of re-examining their paths.

The talk will address the curatorial cultivation and dialog that has emerged from our current exhibition, thrones and dominions.  Some of the subjects that will be discussed  are:  the effects that art has on identity politics;  self-organization as intervention;  social abstraction; institutional liberalism; history and the unmaking /remaking;  and labor and corporate institutionalism as detachment.

<><><><><><><><><><><>Atmospheres: Dan Tambellini :: Opening Reception
Saturday, February 25th : 5-8pm

Full Circle Photo Gallery
33 East 21st Street : 21218

Atmospheres, a solo exhibition by Maryland based photographer Daniel Tambellini, focuses on the event horizon of land and sea meeting sky. This carefully crafted selection of images focuses on contemplative and atmospheric vistas, in saturated pastels and glowing light. Tambellini’s work focuses primarily on landscapes, drawing inspiration from the wide ocean views, conserved land and expansive skies of Block Island, Rhode Island. Having been introduced to Block Island at a young age, Dan returns frequently to this sanctuary, to capture the island’s splendor as well as to seize the awe of his childhood recollections.

Please join us for a reception with the artist on Saturday February 25, 2017 from 5-8pm. Refreshments are provided and the entire studio is open to the public.

<><><><><><><><><><><>Baltimore Women’s Make Collective February Meet-Up
Sunday, February 26th : 6:30-8:30pm

Open Works
1400 Greenmount Avenue : 21201

We’re back from break!  Open Works will host Baltimore Women’s Maker Collective for our first meet-up of 2017. We’d love for you to be there!

The first item on our agenda will be to review BWMC’s past and present progress, and to develop goals and a rough plan of events for 2017.

We’ll hold an open discussion to learn what it means to be part of a collective. The word “collective” implies shared responsibilities. We want to make this an inclusive, holistic group that creates and promotes diverse opportunities–and that takes a lot of work! What skills or resources do you seek in a collective? What would you want to bring to the table? Share your thoughts, concerns, hopes and goals with our community.

We’ll also facilitate some icebreakers to make new friends, and to become informed of and inspired by campaigns, projects, and events around Baltimore.

Drinks and snacks will be provided. While the event is free, we welcome and  encourage a $5 minimum donation to reimburse us for refreshments!

<><><><><><><><><><><>Generating Conversations: Against a Backdrop of Contemporary Concerns
Monday, February 27th : 7-9pm

MICA Falvey Hall, Brown Center
1301 West Mount Royal Avenue : 21217

A panel discussion featuring Judy Norrell, collector of Southern literature, art and history; Paul Rucker, visual artist, composer and musician; and Tanya Garcia, artist, community activist. Moderated by Dr. DaMaris Hill, artist, writer, educator, social justice advocate. The program is produced in partnership with Morgan State University.

Laying-by Time highlights a broad sample of work by William Christenberry. Drawing on his explorations, recollections and interpretations of Hale County, Ala., Christenberry balanced the beauty, hopefulness and resilience of the deep south against its tensions, pathos and flaws. Moving fluidly between painting, photography, sculpture and drawing, the artist wove a story that is simultaneously celebratory and melancholy, inviting and inhospitable.

Visit mica.edu/layingbytime to see a full list of events associated with this exhibition.

<><><><><><><><><><><>The Ground :: Artist Talk
Monday, February 27th : 6-8pm

Hutzler Brothers Palace Museum
210-218 North Howard Street : 21202

The Contemporary presents The Ground, a solo commission by New York and Richmond-based artist Michael Jones McKean, at the historic Hutzler Brothers Palace Building, located at 200 North Howard Street. The project is free and open to the public from February 18 through May 19, 2017.

Hutzler Brothers Palace, erected in 1888, and originally advertised as a “museum of merchandise” was the first department store of its kind in Baltimore. In the shell of this former emporium, McKean has fabricated a massive, multi-room, two-story structure, an architectonic labyrinth enfolding diverse aesthetic languages and multiple modes of representation. He merges the museological, the domestic, the store display, the geological, the theatrical, and the digital. In its totality, he has created an extended metaphor on “place”. Not place as a stagnant reality fixed in time, but as an emergent, fecund, and evolving set of conditions metabolizing past histories into the present.

With The Ground, McKean proposes longer overlapping and diverging timelines where human and non-human actants live in close, nonhierarchical proximity with their time scales flattened and enmeshed. Here, a handmade replica of the human brain co-mingles casually with that of a wolf, whale, cat, and elephant. An out-of-time cave diorama shares a wall with twelve heads, possibly those of costumed members of some undetermined, future leaning, pan-cultural cult. A mise-en-scene built of clay and dirt depicting people participating in a water birth of a new human conflates the contemporary and historical, creation myth and quotidian, abject realism and magic realism.

<><><><><><><><><><><>Looking Ahead: Reserve your ticket to our artist talk!

Artists as Culture Producers: Sharon Louden, William Powhida, and Cara Ober in Conversation

Join us on Thursday, March 9 at 6:30 pm with NY-based artist and author Sharon Louden. After the international success of Living and Sustaining a Creative Life: Essays by 40 Working Artists, Louden returns to Baltimore with NY-based artist William Powhida to discuss her newest book Artist as Culture Producer. The informal discussion will focus on Culture Producer’s concept: the value of artists who promote the work of other artists. The talk will include BmoreArt’s Cara Ober, one of the 40 featured artists in the book.

This lecture is free and will be followed by a reception at Motor House for guests. There are 150 seats available, so reserve yours today – here.

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