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.
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Silber Gallery
Goucher College : Towson
January 29 – March 16
Goucher College is pleased to welcome to its campus the 2018-19 Nancy G. Unobskey Visiting Artist in Modern and Contemporary Art, Laylah Ali. The Unobskey Fund brings internationally recognized artists to Goucher’s campus and provides students with meaningful and significant access to the fellows via exhibitions, studio visits, and lectures.
On the occasion of her fellowship, the Silber Gallery will present The Acephalous Series, the artist’s first solo exhibition in Baltimore, MD.
Widely known for her iconic series, the Greenheads, which was the subject of a traveling museum exhibition from 2012-13, Ali explores power dynamics and interpersonal conflict through compositions that position culturally and sexually ambiguous figures in precarious, loaded, and unexpectedly humorous situations. The precision with which Ali creates her small, figurative, gouache paintings on paper is such that it takes her many months to complete a single work. In The Acephalous Series, Ali has introduced a fraught community of figures, including those with minimal bodies, some who lack heads, and others who appear to be on an endless, determined trek.
Ali has high expectations set for those who engage with her work. The Acephalous Series presents calculated, precise depictions of inconclusive scenes and asks the viewer to interpret them. Rather than revealing the “correct answer,” her work provokes individual inquiry and discovery. It is a series to be studied and experienced, not merely seen. The paintings are loaded but subtle, supporting one another while adding a new facet to the stark and mysterious narrative. The ambiguous vignettes pose questions, heighten emotions, and provide a platform for connection, ultimately leading to further discussion. The Acephalous Series points to inequity and injustice while asking viewers to assess the location, enter the conflict, and express an opinion—and maybe conceive a solution.
To coincide with the exhibition’s closing reception, Ali will present a public artist talk on campus in Merrick Lecture Hall at 7:30 p.m. March 14. Silber gallery and Goucher College’s Studio Art and Art History programs have partnered with Pellinore Press to produce a limited-edition publication to be released at the closing reception. The publications are free to attendees of the lecture on a first-come-first-serve basis, and the project is supported by Blick Artist Materials.
Ali has had solo exhibitions at the Albright-Knox Art Gallery, Buffalo, NY; the Institute of Contemporary Art, Boston, MA; and the Museum of Modern Art, New York, NY. Her work is included in the permanent collections of the Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago, IL; the New Museum of Contemporary Art, New York, NY; the Studio Museum in Harlem, New York, NY; and the Walker Art Center, Minneapolis, MN, amongst many others. Her work has also been featured in the PBS series on contemporary art, Art21.
SNF Parkway + MICA Lazarus Center
NonToxic Masculinity Exhibition Opening Reception
Thursday, February 7 • 6-9 pm
Frederick Douglass-Isaac Myers Maritime Park and Museum
1417 Thames St, Baltimore, Maryland 21231
Proscenium Theatre
UMBC : 21250
Known for its edgy artistic collaborations between choreographers, composers, sound artists, visual artists, engineers, and technologists, Baltimore Dance Project presents the creative work of co-directors Doug Hamby and Carol Hess, performer and choreographer Sandra Lacy, and guest artists. This year’s program at UMBC includes Ann Sofie Clemmensen and Tim Bendernagel’s new duet, Under the Arch, which premiered in 2018 in Odense, Denmark; Sandra Lacy’s Giving Up the Ghost, selected for this year’s Maryland Choreographers Showcase; Carol Hess’ Shooting Gallery; and premieres by BDP co-directors Hess and Doug Hamby.
Baltimore Dance Project infuses visual media, sound, light and technology into riveting dance performance. Formed in 1982 under the name Phoenix Dance Company, BDP features outstanding performers from the Baltimore/Washington area and has been honored with numerous grants and awards. Hamby, Hess and Lacy have received a total of sixteen individual artist awards from the Maryland State Arts Council, and their work has appeared on the streets of Baltimore and in theaters and film festivals across the United States.
Tickets: $20 general admission, $10 students and seniors, $7 UMBC students. Tickets are available online at tickets.umbc.edu and can also be purchased at the box office one hour prior to showtime.
The Peale Center
225 North Holliday Street : 21202
A visual analysis of architecture and its impact on people of impoverished communities
February 7, 2019 – March 22, 2019
Curator: Jeffrey Kent
“Stay dangerous,” a motto coined by D. Watkins, describes Devin Allen’s approach to artistic life and philosophy, and the impetus of his work in Spaces of the Un-Entitled. “Stay dangerous” is a challenge and a promise. It means that if you have the strength and daring to be honest in your experience of and interaction with the world, you can count on two things- Your strength will demand respect, and Your honesty will be a danger to those who live and profit by refusing it- and consequently, a danger to you. As you refuse to yield, you prove you have the strength to back up the danger of honesty. The more you stay dangerous, the more dangerous you become to the status quo.
Allen invites the audience to “Stay dangerous” as they reexamine their perceptions, experiences, and truths of the Spaces of the Un-Entitled, and our shared experience. ‘Spaces’ considers the immersive and connective qualities of photography, installation, and performance. The day after opening night, Devin Allen will speak with ghosts from his Un-Entitled past, the ghosts who reside in what was left behind, who are lost as Gentrification erases the history of neighborhoods.
“Stay dangerous” is about respect, as Spaces of the Un-Entitled respects the architectural history of the homes and lives left behind. And it’s about truth, as Devin Allen refuses to allow these spaces and lives to disappear under spackle and paint.
February 7, 6-9pm OPENING RECEPTION: Devin Allen Art Talk with Q & A
February 8th, 7pm – Devin Allen One Man Performance
February 15th, 7pm – Baltimore Based Artist Kondwani Russell
February 22nd, 7pm – Devin Allen One Man Performance
March 1st, 7pm – Baltimore Based Artist Kondwani Russell
March 22nd, 6pm-9pm CLOSING RECEPTION: Collaboration Performance with Devin Allen, Cheyanne Givens, Kondwani Russell and Chris Wilson
Who is Devin Allen?
Devin Allen is a self taught artist, born and raised in West Baltimore. He gained national attention when his photograph of the Baltimore Uprising was published on the cover of Time in May 2015 – only the third time the work of an amateur photographer had been featured. His photographs have also appeared in New York Magazine, the New York Times, the Washington Post, Aperture, and in the permanent collections of the National Museum of African American History & Culture, the Reginald F. Lewis Museum and the Studio Museum in Harlem. Now, known as a professional photographer, he is the founder of Through Their Eyes, a youth photography educational program and the winner of the 2017 Gordon Parks Foundation Fellowship.
Claudia Rankine | President’s Reading Series
Thursday, February 7 • 6-8 pm
Johns Hopkins University Homewood Campus
3400 North Charles Street : 21218
Born in Kingston, Jamaica, poet Claudia Rankine earned a BA at Williams College and an MFA at Columbia University. Rankine has published several collections of poetry, including Citizen: An American Lyric (2014), a finalist for the National Book Award and winner of the National Book Critics Circle Award in Poetry, the PEN Center USA Poetry Award, and the Forward poetry prize; Don’t Let Me Be Lonely: An American Lyric (2004); and Nothing in Nature is Private (1994), which won the Cleveland State Poetry Prize
28 Days: A City Arts Residents Exhibition | Opening Reception
Friday, February 8 • 7-10pm
Gallery CA
440 East Oliver Street : 21202
Please join us for a new show at Gallery CA featuring the artwork of resident artists from City Arts Apartments. Titled 28 Days to reflect February, the shortest month of year in the heyday of winter, the show celebrates the alignment of the practice of these artists in time and space.
Gallery CA is a contemporary arts space devoted to showcasing local, regional, national and international artists. The gallery also serves as an agent for community engagement by offering regular programming and creating sustainable partnerships with local arts institutions and community organizations.
Gallery CA is located on the ground floor of the City Arts building, which houses 69 artist live/work spaces.
Jack Coyle – Splutter and Austin Eddy – Wooden Mushroom Garden
Opening Reception Saturday, February 9: 6-9 pm
RESORT
235 Park Ave.
www.resortbaltimore.com
February 9th – March 15th, 2019
Free Workshops By Artists For Artists
Saturday, February 9 • 11am-4pm
Cardinal
1758 Park Ave, Baltimore, Maryland 21217
Join us for the last day of our exhibition Intention/Resolution, featuring FREE artist workshops and lectures.
Paper Marbling and Journaling
Artist Kelly Laughlin will lead a paper marbling workshop that focuses on how to approach your art practice through mindfulness and journaling.
Artists & The Marketplace: Creating Value and a Sustainable Practice
Artist Khadija Adell will offer a free lecture exploring the ways that artists can engage with the marketplace, create value for their work, and maintain a sustainable career. Participants will walk away with handouts to help guide the creation of their own archive thereafter.
Spiritual First Aid
Artist Nicoletta de la Brown will lead participants in a workshop to create their own personal Spiritual First Aid Kit, filled with objects that promote inner healing and sustainability. Participants are encouraged to bring objects that are personally important or motivating to their own practice as well as a vessel that will serve as their first aid kit. Empty vessels (pictured above) can also be purchased from the artist for $30 on the day of the workshop. (Vessels are vegan leather and include enamel pin and note from the artist.)
Please see the schedule for the day below.
Image: Nicoletta de la Brown, “Spiritual First Aid Kit” (studio view), 2018-ongoing
David Driskell: Memories of Romare Bearden
Saturday, February 9: 1-3 pm
Reginald F. Lewis Museum
830 E Pratt St, Baltimore, Maryland 21202
Dr. David C. Driskell, one of the world’s leading authorities on the subject of African-American art, will give a lecture discussing his personal memories of Romare Bearden and his incredible works as an artist. Discover Bearden through the eyes of a friend and one of America’s greatest art scholars.
In conjunction with Romare Bearden: Visionary Artist
Terrault
218 West Saratoga Street : 21201
Terrault is pleased to announce the opening reception for “Don’t Worry Your Head”, a solo exhibition of works by Ellie Dent.
The work of Ellie Dent focuses on the experience of being a patient in today’s health industry. Her visual interests are at the intersection of medical science, object making, and traumatic experience. Motivated by fear and fetish, her work stems from a personal narrative of medical trauma, the impact of diagnosis, and the rituals of chronic illness.
Using primarily steel and appropriated hospital materials, the work’s simultaneous presence and absence of the human body raises conversations about mortality and control. Materially, Dent use specific objects that patients interact with during examination that identify them as patient, like hospital gowns and exam table paper. Her work also reflects an interest in materials that exist in a space without the doctor that recalls memories of being a patient, like pharmaceutical waste. Dent assigns these materials as souvenirs for the purpose of discussing the topics of sentimentality, confession, and collection. These materials remind us that we are always subjects to a medical industry.
The steel armatures present in the work are designed to present the body as a specimen, heightening the sensation of vulnerability and humiliation of examination. Designing with the proportion of the body in mind, Dent prompts the viewer to examine the body like a doctor. She takes inspiration from the meat industry, where animals are treated as objects in a condition that’s unsterile, unregulated, and violent. Dent’s work is also a reflection of being a woman in America trying to navigate the tenuous battle of gaining and losing control of our bodies during the current political debate on healthcare.
Dent’s body of work, although diverse in material and imagery, is a critique of the display of power in the health industry
Biography:
Ellie Dent (b. 1991) is an artist working in the mediums of painting and sculpture. Dent was born in Baltimore, Maryland and received a BFA in painting, drawing, and printmaking from Towson University in 2013 and a MFA from the University of Georgia in 2017. She has exhibited work at the Georgia Museum of Art, Marcia Wood Gallery, Day & Night Projects as well as exhibited with Satellite Projects during Art Basel Miami 2015. Her work has been published in Hyperallergic, ArtsATL and SciArt Magazine. She is currently faculty at Georgia State University in Atlanta, Georgia where she resides.
Closing Reception: Thursday, March 21st 7-9PM
Gallery Hours: Saturdays, 1-5PM or by appointment.
ICA Baltimore
16 West North Avenue : 21201
ICA Baltimore is excited to announce the artists participating in the 2019 ICA Flat File Program! Artworks were chosen from over five hundred entries, and include work in a variety of media, from drawing and painting to photography, cloth and plastic; from artists from the Baltimore-DC area as well as artists from recent ICA exhibitions.
We will kick off the program with an exhibition with a brunch opening on February 10th, 12-4pm at the ICA gallery, and the show will remain up until February 24. Artworks will then move into the flat files in the back of the gallery and will be available for viewing and purchase until the end of the year. All items in the flat file are priced under $500, and will be available on our website, for purchase and shipping.
2019 ICA Flat File Program artists:
Adriana Baler, Ben Piwower, John Bohl, Amanda Burnham, Emily Campbell, Lynn Cazabon, Zoe Charlton, Marybeth Chew, Hannah Cohen, Collis/Donadio, Angela Conant, Graham Coreil-Allen, Bonnie Crawford, Alexander D’Agostino, Rodolphe Delaunay, Liz Donadio, Selina Doroshenko, Carrie Fucile, Skye Gilkerson, Rachel Guardiola, Nia Hampton, Benjamin Kelley, Chandi Kelley, William Knipsher, Magnolia Laurie, Jon Malis, Alexandra Oehmke, Janet Olney, Ada Pinkston, Jonathon Poliszuk, Ding Ren, Edgar Reyes, Margaret Rogers, Josh Sender, Sarah Sharp, Andrea Sherill Evans, Ayaka Takao, David Ubias, Elena Volkova, Julie Wills
