BmoreArt

This Week: We are featuring online events that you can participate in from the comfort of your own couch plus a few ways to get involved locally and nationally. Stay home, stay healthy, stay engaged in the arts. For more information and resources for artists during coronavirus quarantine, please see our previous post: Actionable Items: Arts-Related Resources in the Age of COVID-19

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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We’ll send you our top stories of the week, selected event listings, and our favorite calls for entry—right to your inbox every Tuesday.

Cultural Spaces Capital Support Fund
deadline August 14
sponsored by City of Baltimore Department of Planning

The City of Baltimore provides limited support to cultural organizations each year through the capital budget. Every two years, organizations can apply for General Obligation (GO) bonds for eligible capital improvements to their facilities.

Purpose

The goal is to provide capital support to organizations that promote arts and culture in Baltimore City and contribute to the City’s unique identity, ensuring opportunities to experience arts and culture for residents and tourists alike.

Eligible Organizations

The process is open to not for profit museums, galleries, and theaters, as well as all arts or cultural venues within designated arts and entertainment districts (click here for a map of these districts or visit the Maryland State Arts Council website to search by address). Any organization that wishes to apply must be a registered non-profit in good standing with the State Department of Assessment and Taxation. Organizations must have a physical location in Baltimore City, and must either own the facility or have a long-term lease and primary responsibility for capital improvements. The facility must be open to the general public.

Eligible Projects

Eligible capital projects, as defined by Board of Estimates policy, are any physical betterment or improvement and any preliminary studies and surveys relative thereto, including, but not limited to, any property of a permanent nature, and equipment needed in connection with such improvement, when first erected or acquired. This does NOT include projects or improvements costing less than $50,000; vehicular equipment; items of a repair or maintenance nature costing less than $100,000 or which are of an emergency nature; or salaries other than those which are properly capitalized as part of the project cost. Projects should have a minimum 15-year service life.

Examples of projects funded in the past include upgrades to a plaza or entrance to accommodate customers with limited mobility, roof replacements, building envelope upgrades, elevator replacements, or museum/exhibit expansions.

Funds Available

There is a total of $1 million per year available to support capital improvements at cultural institutions in Baltimore. Individual awards will not exceed $200,000 over two years. Typical awards will be between $50,000-$100,000 over a two year period.

Timeline

The application process occurs every two years, generally aligned with the Loan Authorization process. The process to apply for FY22 and FY23 GO bonds begins in May 2020:

Applications Available: Mid-June
Information Session (Webinar): June 30, 2020 at 10am (a recording will be made available after). View a recording or presentation slides.
Applications Due: August 14, 2020
Applicants Notified of Decisions: October 15, 2020 (awards are contingent on approval of FY22 and FY23 capital budget)

AIA Film Challenge 2020 | Call for Entry
deadline August 24
sponsored by AIA Baltimore

Design has the power to solve some of the biggest issues facing cities today. We believe these stories are among the most important stories we can tell. The AIA Film Challenge is a film contest that amplifies these stories—architects partnering with communities and civic leaders to design a healthy, sustainable, just world that improves lives.

The challenge is open to everyone. Use your smartphone or computer to produce a 60- to 90-second mini documentary. You could win up to $7,000!

2020 Municipal Art Society Artist Travel Prize
deadline August 31
sponsored by BOPA

The Baltimore Office of Promotion & The Arts, Inc. (BOPA) is proud to announce the fourth edition of the Municipal Art Society of Baltimore City Artist Travel Prize, sponsored by the Municipal Art Society of Baltimore City (MASB). The Municipal Art Society of Baltimore was founded in 1899 as part of the City Beautiful movement. It is one of only two remaining societies to be operating under its original charter “to provide sculptural and pictorial decoration and ornaments for the public buildings, streets and open spaces in the City of Baltimore, and to help generally beautify the City.”

Artistic contributions to the City span more than one hundred years. In 2016 the MASB embarked on a path to provide new opportunities to Baltimore artists and art places within the City. This prize will award $6,000 to a visual artist or visual artist collaborators, living in Baltimore City. Successful proposals will be selected from submissions that clearly articulate the artist’s reason for travel and how it relates to their work, along with support materials. The $6,000 prize is intended to function as funding for travel essential to an artist’s studio practice that an artist may not otherwise be able to afford.

As part of your application, consider speaking to our current pandemic and what the prospect of traveling for your studio practice would mean, especially given no one is traveling very much as this moment. With this in mind, we will be flexible with the selected artist, should travel not be possible further into 2021 than we are estimating at this time.

Create! Magazine Print Issue #23 | Call For Art
deadline August 31

Create! Magazine is pleased to announce an international open call for the print issue #23 juried by Ginger Rudolph.

Submit your work to be published in print and have it seen by our 170,000+ readers and followers worldwide, including leading galleries, art fairs, collectors, curators, writers, art consultants, and more.

A portion of submission fees will go to the Black Art Features Fund.

Guest Curator: Ginger Rudolph, Founder & Editor of HAHA Mag (High on Art, Heavy on Antics) & Co-founder of HAHAxParadigm. Ginger is a curator, arts writer, and the founder of HAHA Magazine, which focuses on immersing readers in the global arts realm through fun art education. Co-founder of HAHAxParadigm, a Philadelphia based collective that curates and produces engaging public art projects.

Please visit our website to read the full call for art details and prospectus page:

BMA Violet Hour: Meccamorphosis | InstagramLIVE
Wednesday, July 29 • 6pm
presented by The Baltimore Museum of Art

Mecca “Meccamorphosis” Verdell is a world-renowned spoken word poet, author, actress, and creator. In a time of unprecedented social change, join Mecca on Instagram Live for a conversation on poetry, the importance of expression, and the power of speaking up.
BMA Violet Hour is a series of online programs designed to give viewers an opportunity to relax and connect with artists, makers, and the community through meditations, artist talks, and other interactive experiences.

Tracy Barwick // Hotel Indigo | Opening Reception
Thursday, July 30 • 5-7pm | Ongoing through August 12
presented by Maryland Art Place + Hotel Indigo

Join Maryland Art Place (MAP) and Hotel Indigo in celebrating new works by Maryland artist, Tracy Barwick. Barwick’s paintings will be hung in Hotel Indigo’s library and Poets Modern Cocktails and Eats. In addition to Barwick’s exhibition on view at Hotel Indigo, her work can also be viewed online Saturday, June 27 – August 12, on MAP’s new virtual gallery located on our website.

About the Artist:

Educated as an engineer, Barwick decided to delve into her passion, creating art. Her hometown roots begin in Dayton, OH. but she now calls Maryland/DC her second home. Barwick truly believes there is no other place like Maryland. “Maryland has such an eclectic vibe composed of arts, museums, history, culture, and more, the inspiration is endless and is a constant source of creativity for me,” Barwick remarks. Barwick’s artistic narrative is simple: personifying emotions, beliefs, and social concepts through ethnic patterns, shadings, and mediums across the full spectrum of color.

Her choice of mediums is glass (seed) beads, acrylics, and embroidery floss. Barwick often challenges herself to use every color imaginable in her work. She partners her palette with shapes and thin lines, representing feelings and emotions, intertwining within each other creating…chaos. Past years have proven to be full of new beginnings, lessons, and experiences which have informed her work. Time, patience, imagination, and experience has allowed Barwick’s art to evolve beyond her own boundaries and continue to mature over time.

Due to COVID and the ever changing social distancing landscape, we ask that all guests RSVP for the reception. Please contact [email protected] to reserve your spot

We hope to see you Wednesday, July 30 from 5 – 7pm for the opening reception.

Validated parking is available at 15 West Franklin St. Garage.

Live! Art Sound Now with Amy Reid and Pangelica
Thursday, July 30 • 5:30pm
hosted by The Walters Art Museum

Multi-media artists Amy Reid and Pangelica join us for a live talk followed by a Q & A about their recent performance for the Walters Art Museum’s Art Sound Now series (available on YouTube). Immortal Voices focuses on themes of healing and destruction through ambient sound and performance.

Voices of Carmen | Outdoor “Carmen Concert”
Thursday, July 30 • 6:30pm
presented by Voices of Carmen (VOC)

Created in 2018 as a musical adaptation of the opera Carmen set in a high school, the Voices of Carmen (VOC) musical brings a contemporary spin to this iconic story that’s filled with fresh yet familiar renditions of George Bizet’s compositions, as well as a dozen original songs, from Pop to Hip Hop and R&B, written and arranged by CJay and Winston Philip.

This vibrantly staged and choreographed piece examines escalating conflict among young people, and hopes to serve as a catalyst for community dialogue and improved emotional health and awareness, while providing resources for conflict resolution. A virtual performance of excerpts through the Enoch Pratt Library premieres July 20, and an outdoor “Carmen Concert” will take place July 30 at Eager Park.

This year, VOC has 34 young people, 26 cast members and 8crew members mentored by a staff of 8 adults.  All performances are free of charge and will rely on audience donations to raise $12,500.00 needed to meet the programs budget.

Like last year, each performance will incorporate interactive aspects where the audience gets to comment on and discuss the conflicts and actions as they arises. Audiences found this particularly surprising and satisfying. Audiences can also join a weekly Carmen Conversation produced by the crew/production team which live streams on Tuesdays 1pm July 21 through Aug 11 on Voices of Carmen YouTube Channel.

Baynard Woods And Brandon Soderberg: I Got A Monster: The Rise And Fall Of America’s Most Corrupt Police Squad (Moderated By Shea Serrano)
Thursday, July 30 • 6:30pm
hosted by The Ivy Bookshop

The Ivy is thrilled to welcome Baynard Woods and Brandon Soderberg for a reading and discussion of their new book, I Got a Monster: The Rise and Fall of America’s Most Corrupt Police Squad. This conversation will be moderated by Shea Serrano. This event will take place on Zoom.

Click here to register for the event!

Click here to purchase the book!

The explosive true story of America’s most corrupt police unit, the Gun Trace Task Force (GTTF), which terrorized the city of Baltimore for half a decade.

When Baltimore police sergeant Wayne Jenkins said he had a monster, he meant he had found a big-time drug dealer—one that he wanted to rob. This is the story of Jenkins and the Gun Trace Task Force (GTTF), a super group of dirty detectives who exploited some of America’s greatest problems: guns, drugs, toxic masculinity, and hypersegregation. In the upside-down world of the GTTF, cops were robbers and drug dealers were the perfect victims, because no one believed them. When the federal government finally arrested the GTTF for robbery and racketeering in 2017, the stories of victims began to come out, revealing a vast criminal enterprise operating within the Baltimore Police Department. Cops planted heroin to cover up a fatal crash that resulted from a botched robbery. They stole hundreds of thousands of dollars, faked video evidence, and forged a letter trying to break up the marriage of one of their victims to keep his wife from paying a lawyer. And a homicide detective was killed the day before he was scheduled to testify against the crooked cops. I Got a Monster is the shocking history of the rise and fall of the most corrupt cops in America from Baynard Woods and Brandon Soderberg.

BDM Annual Youth Conference
Friday, July 31 • 10am-2pm
hosted by Banneker-Douglass Museum

It’s back! Join us online on July 31st, from 10 am until 2 pm for the third annual BDM Youth Conference. This year’s theme is The Black Vote Mural Project. Viewers will experience motivational speakers, spoken word performances, learn ways to use public art as activism, and more.

This virtual summit is dedicated to the empowerment of Maryland’s youth. Now is the time to learn about how you can participate in democracy and be an agent of change in your community. Be encouraged to use your voice to advocate for the change you want to see; your voice counts!

Presentations:

The History of Youth Protest: Dr. David Fakunle – Chair, Maryland Lynching Project

The Power of Social Media:  Rashad Stanton – Youth Engagement Specialist, Baltimore City Public Schools

Black Power & Graffiti – Public Art as Activism: Chanel Compton (Keynote) Executive Director, Banneker-Douglass Museum & Maryland Commission on African American History and Culture

Protest Books for Young Readers, Baltimore Read Aloud

Breonna Taylor – Black Lives Matter Mural Presentation, Future History Now

Performers:

Kentavius Jones – Singer/Musician

P.O.P, Children’s Defense Fund Freedom Schools

Resources:

Voter Registration

Give-Aways

Educational Resources and More!

Logan Visionary Virtual Eco-Conference: The Secret Life of Earth | A Virtual Gathering
Sunday, August 2 • 1pm
hosted by The American Visionary Art Museum

In complement to the American Visionary Art Museum (AVAM’s) 25th original (and freakishly timely) mega-exhibition, “The Secret Life of Earth,” you are invited to the free-to-all Logan Visionary Eco-Conference generously sponsored by The Revada Foundation. The conference commemorates the 50th anniversary of the original Earth Day celebration and features presentations by globally-respected climate scientists, researchers, agronomists, and impassioned earth activists.

Our special keynote speaker is filmmaker and famed time-lapse photographer Louie Schwartzberg, who will also be recognized with AVAM’s very highest honor, the Grand Visionary Award. The full speaker lineup is:

• 1pm Rebecca Hoffberger AVAM Founder, Director, Curator

• 1:10pm Louie Schwartzberg (Keynote Speaker and AVAM’s Grand Visionary Award recipient): Nature’s foremost time-lapse photographer, award-winning producer, director, cinematographer and earth activist

• 1:40pm Julia Butterfly Hill: Famed environmental champion, author, visionary eco-futurist

• 2pm Tamara Toles O’Laughlin: Advocate for people and planet. North American Director at 350.org

• 2:15pm Steven Kaii-Ziegler: Anne Arundel County head of Office of Planning and Zoning gives a Maryland climate change impact update

• 2:30pm Pablo Suarez: Red Cross Climate Center’s Associate Director for Research and Innovation and master collaborator uniting global artists and leading climate scientists

• 2:55pm Liliana Jaramillo: Scientist, founder of Nativus Vegetación, and UN Young Champions of the Earth awardee

The Logan Visionary Conference is made possible as a free public event through the kindness and generosity of The Revada Foundation.

After postponing our Spring Print Journal – Issue 09: Craft – we are moving ahead to print with a New Subscription Service!  Issue 09: Craft is now at our printer and will be mailed out the first and second weeks of August. THANK YOU for subscribing !!!!

For more information head to our Subscription page at BmoreArt.com.