This Week: We are featuring online events that you can participate in from the comfort of your own couch plus a few calls for entry to get involved locally and nationally. Stay home, stay healthy, stay engaged in the arts.
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Timothy App: States of Mind
ongoing through March 31
@ Goya Contemporary
Goya Contemporary Gallery is pleased to present a solo exhibition of paintings by Contemporary American artist Timothy App (B. 1947 Akron, OH. Lives and works in Baltimore, MD), whose work is included numerous significant public and private collections including the Baltimore Museum of Art; Albright-Knox Museum, NY; Long Beach Museum of Art; Museum of Fine Arts Santa Fe; Tucson Museum of Art, AZ; Art Cloud, Korea; The Phillips Collection, DC; among others.
Over the last five decades, Timothy App has developed a body of work that engages a complex exploration of abstract painting and has contribution to the larger art historical narrative around geometric practice. App’s signature style of geometric abstraction, with its assertive visual tensions, reveals a concise and thoughtful understanding of the nature of painting.
Talking about the work, App says: “These recent Threshold paintings are, in part, a confrontation with nothingness, placing the unsuspecting viewer on the brink of the unknown. And like much of my work, they are anthropometric in scale—body-sized– and symmetrical, facilitating the human being’s moment of encounter. On another level, they are a continuation of my ongoing endeavor to find authentic ways of making a painting. They have evolved over twenty years in tandem with other series. Like all of my work, they demonstrate a coalescence of formal concerns that I have carried with me for a very long time.”
He further elaborates by saying: “With a static work of art, meaning lies in the immediate encounter … where the moment of recognition occurs. At that instant, every deployment of form, every nuance of color and tone, every juncture of vital elements become paramount, and are there for the viewer’s thoughtful perusal.”
The artist has remained productive through the innumerable challenges presented by the times in which we live. Looking inward at this moment, App reflects on a lifetime of painting in his exhibition accompanying “Notes on Painting” and states: “After so many years of painting with a consistent premise, the ‘larger context’ has all but evaporated. What I do as an artist has become so intrinsic to who I am, so ingrained psychically, so mirrored in my personal history, that matters of social and political relevance have become inconsequential to my labors as an artist. A patient search, through a persistent endeavor with formal and aesthetic concerns, is the antithesis of the struggle for power. And political and social exigencies, as inevitable and necessary as they are, feed on the acquisition of and use, or abuse, of power. If my work deals at all with power, then I would hope that it is the power of the eye and hand guided by the mind and the imagination.”
The exhibition, Timothy App: States of Mind, will feature 7 new, large scale paintings and 6 studies which bring together various aspects of the artist’s evolution and growth, demonstrating his status as one of the region’s most important living painters.
Codex | Online Exhibition
ongoing through March 13
presented by UMBC Center for Art, Design, and Visual Culture
Codex opens Jan 28 and runs through March 13, 2021, featuring the artwork of Brandon Ables, Jason Charney, Mandy Morrison, and Adan Rodriguez.
Encompassing a wide range of technologies and materials, their works embody the elements of social practice and community involvement as well as critiques on contemporary culture. The artists are 2020 recipients of MFA degrees in Intermedia and Digital Arts and were to be featured in an in-person exhibition originally scheduled for spring 2020; their works are now presented in a virtual environment.
Codex will be available as a virtual tour on the CADVC’s web page starting February 4th. The gallery will remain closed to the public.
Phaan Howng: A Bag of Rocks for A Bag of Rice
ongoing through May 15
@ Asian Arts & Culture Center at Towson University
Exquisitely disposed rocks and trees and vegetation. The promise of an inspired space of meditation and detachment. Such has been of the Westernized image of the Chinese and Japanese garden. Yet such enchanted “natural” spaces camouflage histories of empire, wealth, privilege, and exploitation of labor responsible for ecological extraction and displacement in order to create these private environments.
Fascinated by the human desire to create heterotopias (worlds within worlds, mirroring and yet distinguishing themselves from what is outside) through landscaping, Howng channels her heritage and uses Towson University’s Asian Arts Gallery as a site-specific platform to engage East Asian gardens as a case study. She suggests that the managed gardening practices and aesthetics implemented by those in positions of power and wealth were, historically speaking, aspects of a world-wide trend of appropriation and domination that led to our current global climate crisis.
Howng’s installation represents the Chinese garden by treating the gallery like a theatrical set. Taking cues from Ji Cheng’s (計成) manual “The Craft of Chinese Gardens” (園冶 yuán yě) written sometime in 1631 and 1634 — to create “artificial mountains” (假山 Jiǎshān) out of rocks — and researching the inspirations and motivations behind the creation of private gardens during the Ming Dynasty, Howng creates her own idealized mountain landscape and garden.
The exhibition title, “A Bag of Rocks for a Bag of Rice” refers to the process of creating a famous Zen garden in Kyoto visited by writer Italo Calvino. In his essay, “The Obverse of the Sublime,” he wrote about a tour of the perfectly harmonious space. The guide unwittingly revealed the human exploitation which made possible the consummate landscape: “These stones were brought here three centuries ago from every part of Japan. The Emperor rewarded whomever brought him a bag of stones with a bag of rice.”
Reflecting on Calvino’s essay, Howng inserts herself as both artist and laborer. Instead of simply painting landscapes on paper, hung on the wall, she physically constructs and paints mountains in three-dimensional space to be walked around. Made of cut plywood, they are hinged together, mimicking a mountain-scape and room divider.
Howng exaggerates all of the “unnaturalness” in contemporary gardens today. Consider how we use particular grasses, trees, and bushes from other regions, displaced and then replaced thus displacing indigenous plants. What about other “unnatural” but natural looking features: rubber mulch, fake rocks with speakers in them, a fountain?
Howng also mines objects from her studio that represent elements of Chinese landscape paintings — scholar’s rock, fauna, and more — and repaints them in the color scheme of Chinese porcelain to highlight their value as precious objects and the luxury items that imperial and colonial cultures define them as. She surrounds these objects with rocks purchased from Home Depot as well as fine blue and white porcelain from the Asian Arts and Culture Center’s historic art collection. But surrounding the garden Howng creates a barrier which prevents uninvited guests from sitting in and taking in the space, causing us to wonder about who has access to these gardens.
Thanks in part to COVID-19, to exacerbate this, the gallery and space acts as another layer to her concept — who has access?
Howng hopes that bringing these connections to light will inspire people to rethink how they cultivate their own gardens and adapt their practices to provide for a better ecological future.
Phaan Howng wishes to acknowledge that her exhibition was created and takes place on the ancestral lands of the Paskestikweya People which is known today as Baltimore and Towson. She humbly offers her respects to the Piscataway community for the privilege of having this exhibition due to the direct and indirect violence of settler communities. She hopes that this exhibition can help further the understanding of the slow violence that has been inflicted on indigenous people, plants and animals in Maryland and around the world as a result.
10×10 Exhibit: VOICE | Virtual Opening Reception
Wednesday, February 17
presented by Arts Every Day + the BMA
Arts Every Day is proud to present its fifth annual 10×10 Exhibit, featuring over 130 works of art created by Baltimore City Public School students and teachers in response to a culturally relevant body of work, movement, or theme. Each year, the 10×10 Exhibit offers students and teachers a platform to use visual art as a tool for exploring complex ideas and perceptions.
The theme for the 2021 10X10 Exhibit is VOICE. With so much going on in the world today, the need to listen to the voices of our youth are so paramount, especially because the decisions we make today will impact the world our children will grow up in tomorrow. For this exhibit, we invited students and teachers in Baltimore City Public Schools to think about ways art, in its many forms can be used to inform, create discourse, and further understanding. This call for art encouraged students to use whatever creative outlet suited their intended message or their call to action.
This year’s 10X10 Exhibit, like so many other events, looks a little different this year. To ensure the health and safety of students, teachers, and families, we decided to take the exhibit online knowing that the artworks submitted would undoubtedly be just as powerful and meaningful as the years before. When you view these works, we ask that you take a moment to reflect on how this year’s submissions are coming from virtual learners. The works you see are a result of creatively utilizing the very limited resources and technology available to both teachers and students at home and how those limitations were overcome so that their voices could be heard.
Arts Every Day partnered with the Enoch Pratt Free Library and the One Book Baltimore Program to offer teachers and students access to programming and resources related to 2020’s selection: We Speak For Ourselves by D. Watkins. We also partnered with University of Maryland, Baltimore County (UMBC) Center for Art, Design and Visual Culture (CADVC) through a generous grant from the Charlesmead Foundation to celebrate and elevate voices of Baltimore City students and teachers, engage students in conversation, reflection, & creation inspired by Southern Rites, and connect students to the impactful work of CADVC, UMBC.
The 10X10 Exhibit virtual reception will be hosted by the Baltimore Museum of Art as part of their Violet Hour program and will take place on February 17, 2021 at 6pm.
Defining Whiteness: Joseph Pennell, Henry Ossawa Tanner, and the Immutable Imprint of the Printer’s Mark
Thursday, February 18
presented by Society of Design Arts, AIGA Baltimore, and Stevenson University
Join the Society of Design Arts, AIGA Baltimore, and Stevenson University for this online talk by Lori N. Johnson, Ph.D., Associate Professor of Art History, Morgan State University, Baltimore, Maryland
Johnson’s research examines the role of the graphic arts in helping to establish and maintain racial and ethnic hierarchies in the United States. Rather than simply focusing on stereotypes of marginalized groups, such as Jews and Blacks, this paper argues that graphic artists, while combining visual art with mass communication, used the power of print media to define whiteness by creating denigrating images of marginalized groups, and limiting these same groups access to the profession.
By looking specifically at the figure of the celebrated American illustrator Joseph Pennell, Johnson’s paper argues that the ultimate goal in producing the images of Blacks and Jews as inferior through linguistic binaries was to define Whites as superior, and thus justify America’s racial and ethnic hierarchies.
Tom Miller Day: Can a Coal Scuttle Fly Reading
Thursday, February 18 • 12pm
presented by Maryland Center for History and Culture
Declared in 1995 by former Baltimore Mayor Kurt Schmoke, Tom Miller Day is an inaugural celebration honoring the life and art of Thomas Patton Miller (1945–2000). The day has been lost in the archives. However, the artist’s spirit and hand still exist all around Baltimore.
Join the Maryland Institute Black Archives, The Maryland Institute College of Art, the city of Baltimore, and some of the artist’s closest friends for a week-long celebration of Tom Miller and his Afro-Deco style during the week of February 18th. Learn about his life, artworks, mural locations, and stories from those who knew him. The highlight of the week will be a reading of ‘Can a Coal Scuttle Fly’ at noon.
‘Can a Coal Scuttle Fly’ is the true tale of a boy with a talent for seeing life and stories in objects, people, and places. He feels good about his world and finds art all around—even in something as unlikely as an old coal scuttle. The children’s book is an autobiography of Tom Miller’s life. Printed by the Maryland Historical Society the book is illustrated by the artist. It is written by Camay Calloway Murphy, a retired American educator, and the daughter of Jazz bandleader and singer, Cab Calloway.
This event is part of Tom Miller Art Week, February 15–19, 2021
MICA Institute Black Archives
IG @miba.online Share your memories of the artist
Up to 11! Anniversary Celebration
Monday, February 22 • 7:30pm | Ongoing through February 26
presented by Make Studio
After what can only be described as the strangest year in Make Studio’s history, we’re looking forward to soon easing back into in-person operations this spring! In the meantime, we’re celebrating a special time for us every year, our annual anniversary extravaganza! This year we’re turning things up to 11!
Recent times have proven more than ever that variety, in the right doses, is the spice of life, so instead of one party we’re hosting a week of festivities online February 22nd – 27th, as well as a hybrid (online/gallery) show of new and notable pieces by Make Studio artists.
Our “main event”, our artists’ very own virtual VARIETY SHOW on FEB 27, draws inspiration from their “hidden” or lesser known talents (i.e., non-visual arts ones, like jazzy keyboard, singing, celebrity impressions, and more) and their favorite variety shows and performers (think Muppet Show, Laugh-In, The Dolly Parton Show, Carol Burnett Show).
Plan to join in for all or part of the fun! Keep an eye on www.make-studio.org and our social media for event updates!
FEB 22-26, 7:30 PM: Leading up to the live variety show event, tune in here, on Youtube, or Instagram for daily primetime debuts of a special selection of artists’ acts
FEB 26, 6-7 PM: Tune in here for Make Studio Home Shopping Network! – a live shopping event with Cathy Goucher and perhaps a special guest…
FEB 27, 4 PM: Online, live variety show matinee and party, with performances kicking off at 4:15; Zoom link to be provided
FEB 27- MAR 26: Gallery exhibition on view — make an appointment for a distanced visit at [email protected] during listed hours or otherwise by request
Calls for Entry // Opportunities
The SUPREME Gallery | Call for Entry
deadline February 20
sponsored by Creatively Mindful + Supreme Beauty
We know first-hand that this has been a difficult time for artists. So, we consider it our duty to help the art community in any way that we can. This particular opportunity is a monthly exhibition allowing artists the ability to showcase their artworks at a hot commodity location to art-buying clients! It’s a perfect time to get new eyes on your artwork and more importantly, sell pieces from your collection. Did we mention you get to keep 100% of the commission made from your sales? Below there are a few requirements to gauge if this exhibition opportunity is a good fit for you.
Requirements:
-You must be an artist that works in one of the following disciplines:
Photography, Drawing, Painting, PrintMaking, or Graphic Design
-Artists meeting the above criteria will submit an application form and upload images of the works they would like displayed (available on the following page). The owner of the gallery space will screen art work deemed appropriate for the space.
-A fee of $10 per piece (regardless of size) will be required to display your work (remember you keep 100% of whatever price your art sells for).
Submissions close 11:59PM, February 20th
Forecast Change Lab Research Fellow focusing on Racial Justice in Public Art
deadline March 1
sponsored by Forecast Public Art
The time is long overdue to reckon with systemic racism and inequities in our country’s public art policies, practices, and collections and address our collective trauma. We know from four decades as a leader in the public art field that cultural appropriation, art-washing, public art deserts, unethical community engagement practices, and systemic funding and policy barriers keep BIPOC artists and communities from fair, just and equitable representation in our country’s public art.
We also know that there are currently over 700 public art programs in the United States that have policies and funding to continue creating public art. Many of these programs and policies were instituted in the 1960’s and 70’s, and are tied to infrastructure projects and budgets. This system emphasizes permanent, object based projects, discounting public artworks that are temporary, ephemeral, and performance based.
We launched the Change Lab to place a critical eye on public art policies, funding, and processes across the country to understand their connection to and ability to challenge the most pressing issues of our time – racism as a public health crisis, indigenous invisibility, rural isolation, welcoming and belonging, collective trauma, and more.
We’ll engage Research Fellows to catalyze new thinking, test new approaches, and creatively disrupt the status quo to advance justice in the field of public art. Change Lab National Research Fellows will go deep into an area of critical importance, and utilize the findings to create public art demonstration projects that can be put into action across the country, acting as a model of change for public art programs, policies, and processes.
Our goal is to collaborate with communities to create new ways of working within the field of public art and allied fields through cross-sector partnerships, on the ground research, and deep community engagement to address inequities in all facets of public art. Through the Change Lab, we will collectively develop a national public art policy platform that is rooted in justice, health and human dignity for black, brown, and indigenous people.
The Other Art Fair Dallas | Call for Submission
deadline March 4
sponsored by Other Art Fair Dallas
Since 2011, The Other Art Fair has led the way in discovering and nurturing creative talent, allowing artists to forge direct relationships with buyers and gallerists. Presented by leading online gallery Saatchi Art, the Fair holds a unique position of connecting artists directly with buyers, not only for the duration of the Fair but throughout the year.
The Other Art Fair Dallas returns this spring with an exciting triple-threat format:
Virtual Edition + Online Studios + Onsite Fair.
“We are pleased to offer artists a unique opportunity for sustained promotion to collectors and enthusiasts around the world who are eager to discover artworks by the very best emerging and independent talent.” — Nicole Garton, Dallas Fair Director
Artists can expect an 18-week promotional window, including:
The Other Art Fair Dallas at Dallas Market Hall
May 20 – 23
A buzzy, 4-day live event offering exhibitors the chance showcase their works alongside a unique features program, with direct access to art buyers, curators, and gallerists.
The Other Art Fair Dallas: Virtual Edition
May 25 – 30
A 6-day online event, re-imagining the best of the Fair using virtual reality, live streaming, and more, to showcase our exhibitors to a larger-than-ever global audience.
The Other Art Fair Online Studios
Selling $2.5 million+ in artwork since April 2020, our curated e-commerce platform is exclusively for Fair exhibitors.
60th Toronto Outdoor Art Fair
deadline March 8
sponsored by TOAF
NEW THIS YEAR – Not comfortable with returning to Nathan Phillips Square just yet? Join us online only from anywhere in Canada.
Read about how we are ensuring a safe TOAF60 on our website www.torontooutdoor.art
Join us for the 60th Anniversary of Canada’s longest-running contemporary outdoor art Fair. TOAF has been launching artists’ careers and building trust in our community of artists and art lovers since 1961! Apply to our hybrid online/outdoor 60th Toronto Outdoor Art Fair, taking place at Nathan Phillips Square and on our e-commerce platform for 10 days (July 2-11).
Each year, our loyal following of fair-goers spend $2 million on art purchases, providing an income to independent artists that contributes to their economic prosperity. Our 60th Anniversary Fair will be one to remember with new special programs and awards.
Who can apply?
TOAF’s jurors welcome individual artists and makers working in photography, sculpture, painting, glass, wood, textiles, jewellery and more, with formal or informal training to apply. Established and emerging artists are welcome.
Why apply?
Win one of our prestigious awards: TOAF is proud to have awarded artists almost $1 million in the past 60 years. $40K cash and in-kind awards are given to established and emerging artists, with unique opportunities like the Mayor’s Purchase Award and the Best of Student Award.
Grow your network in person and online: TOAF is the best-attended art fair in Canada! The 2020 Online Fair saw a 300% increase in page views to our e-commerce platform and over 43,000 unique visitors from a growing network of online art buyers across Canada, US and beyond.
Customize your sales experience: You can choose to showcase your artworks online on our user-friendly e-commerce platform, or both in-person at Nathan Phillips Square (with pandemic safety measures), and online!
She/ Her/ They/ Them
deadline March 8
sponsored by IncuArts
IncuArts invites women identifying and gender non-conforming artists to submit work for SHE/ HER/ THEY/ THEM- an exhibition exploring ideas related to gender and celebrating women and gender-nonconforming artists.
Entry Deadline: March 8, 2021
Selections Announced- March 13, 2021
Exhibition Dates – March 16- May 1, 2021
Selected artists will have their work featured in the online exhibition and via social media platforms.
Artists of all media are encouraged to apply.
Women, people of color, LGBTQ+, and other community members are encouraged to apply.
Each artwork will be considered based upon the merit of individual images submitted by each artist.
*Entries will be reviewed on a weekly basis until the deadline. Artists are strongly advised to submit their entries early.*
Please see our Calls for Entries page for submission details:
https://www.incuarts.com/she
CRETA Rome 2021 International Artist Residencies in Rome Italy
deadline March 15
sponsored by CRETA
C.R.E.T.A. Rome is an international center for ceramics and the visual arts that organizes artist residencies, relaunching the concept of the ‘Grand Tour’ to rediscover the immense cultural heritage that Rome represents. Located in the heart of the historical center, between the Capitoline Hill and the Jewish quarter, the main studio of CRETA Rome in the 16th-century Palazzo Delfini reflects the layering of the eternal city. The acronym C.R.E.T.A. spells out our main activities: ceramics, residencies, exhibitions, teaching, and the arts.
The interdisciplinary program has hosted more than 140 resident artists from 24 countries and 5 continents since 2013. Emerging, mid-career and established artists selected by an international committee converge on Rome for periods of 1-3 months. Housing in the historical center provides direct contact with Roman life while a second studio in the countryside offers the possibility of reduction firing, collaborative projects, and for artists to be accompanied by their partner and/or family.
Interaction with the local and international community is an important aspect of CRETA Rome’s mission. 8-10 exhibitions per year provide a forum for resident artists to present their work to the public as the culmination of their experience. Ceramic courses are supplemented by artist talks, demos and short-term intensive workshops. In addition to clay, CRETA Rome has hosted fiber artists, graphic artists, painters as well as writers thereby integrating ceramics into the contemporary art sphere.
Application deadlines are spaced throughout the year: 1 January, 15 March and 15 May.
header image: "Artists Rendering of a Landscape" by Phaan Howng (2020)
This week's news includes: Baynard Woods on Larry Hogan's "error-laden" memoir, BMI's new Labor Activism Exhibit, Blacksauce Kitchen, Joyce J. Scott, Glenstone Outdoors this Summer, Rob Lee profiles Anthony Gittens, BSO's Summerfest at the Meyerhoff–and more!
This Week: Bill Schmidt and scholar Kristen Hileman in conversation at C. Grimaldis Gallery, Baltimore School for the Arts Senior Recitals, Work Matters lecture at BMI, Rent Party at Baltimore Museum of Art, Jami Attenberg at Greedy Reads Remington, Out of Order (OOO) and more!
This week's news includes: 25th Annual Maryland Film Festival, Aubrey Plaza cast in John Waters' Liarmouth, Lena Stringari appointed Chief of Conservation at the National Gallery - with reporting from Baltimore Fishbowl, Banner, Brew, and other local and independent news sources!
This Week: Share Your Why artist talk at Motor House, free admission to Walk a Mile in My Dreams + panel discussion with Joyce J. Scott at the BMA, Revolution in our Lifetime roundtable discussion at The Peale, Station North Art Walk, Sprung reception at Waller Gallery, and more!
