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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Liminal Space
Ongoing through February 27
@ Formerly Was
E. Brady Robinson
Elena Volkova
Jill Fannon
Melvin Nesbitt Jr.
Rodney Choice
Washington, DC – Formerly Was is pleased to present Liminal Space, an art exhibition featuring photographic installations by E. Brady Robinson, Elena Volkova, Jill Fannon, and Rodney Choice and collage work by Melvin Nesbitt Jr. The five artists mark, record, and process a very “unfamiliar” year (2020) with pictures.
About the Work
“2020” is a photographic installation by E. Brady Robinson that incorporates intimate moments and personal observations of the social landscape and the natural world. Robinson employs her camera as a diary, using the snapshot aesthetic of small format cameras in her signature style. During pandemic Baltimore, she shares glimpses of her personal life combined with scenes of the public spaces and empty streets. Photographic prints are grouped with intention creating a visual narrative via sequence and juxtaposition.
Meanwhile is a photographic series by Elena Volkova that explores the concept of becoming. The images are observations of moments in constant flux, which poetically document what it means to live through the time of the pandemic and to be compelled to get to know one’s place in a deep introspective way. Through the lens of subjectivity, the artist offers glimpses of domestic environments juxtaposed with natural forms, inviting an escapist journey amidst the chaos.
Jill Fannon’s Care in the Garden is an ongoing photo series of individual accounts and stories of health care workers and those who facilitate care through portraiture, written words, and conversation. The project began during mandated stay-at-home orders in Maryland in early March of 2020, and has relied heavily on distance portraiture and screen-based interactions. The series catalogues those in close physical proximity to others during a time of profound distance. The face of Maria, a nurse in Baltimore, MD, one of the 8 images in the series, is presented “life-size,” allowing the viewer an opportunity for momentary togetherness.
The year 2020 reminded Rodney Choice of what initially drew him to photography while growing up in New York City: making pictures of persons in urban environments. The work entitled DC Streets is a small representation of his observations of people, protests, and politics during the pandemic. His pictures are dynamic. The content is spontaneous and the artist is present for it. His images show courage and heart.
Poverty and food insecurity weighed heavily on Melvin Nesbitt Jr.’s mind as the impacts of the pandemic left many parents without jobs. Holding Up the Line, one of the two collage pieces presented by the artist for this show, depicts a boy’s sudden awareness of the shame associated with being poor as all eyes watch his mother dig through her purse for just enough change to pay for a single bag of groceries. Continuing with his signature style, Nesbitt centers children in his visual narratives of the latest happenings in American life.
LIVE Artist Talk: Muriel Hasbun
Thursday, February 4 • 5:30–6 p.m.
presented by The Walters
Maryland-based artist and educator Muriel Hasbun, who was a finalist for the 2020 Janet & Walters Sondheim Artscape Prize, discusses the importance of how we see people through our own biases and ways we can combat cultural erasure in the contemporary moment. In conversation with Joy Davis, Manager of Adult and Community Program, Muriel shares her work about her cultural identity using her own art and artworks from the Walters Art Museum’s collection as springboards for discussion.
About the Artist: Muriel Hasbun’s expertise as an artist and as an educator focuses on issues of cultural identity, migration, and memory. Through an intergenerational, transnational, and transcultural lens, Muriel constructs contemporary narratives and establishes a space for dialogue where individual and collective memory spark new questions about identity and place.
BmoreArt at The Peale | with Kim Rice and Krista D. Green
Thursday, February 4 • 6:30 p.m.
presented by BmoreArt + The Peale
Zoom Link to Register here.
Join BmoreArt for a Connect+Collect Zoom with artist Kim Rice, whose exhibition, “Inheritance,” at The Peale was named one of BmoreArt’s 10 Best of 2020. Rice will be joined by Krista D. Green, the Chief Administrative Officer at The Peale and BmoreArt’s Jeffrey Kent, who curated the exhibition in his role as Artistic Director at The Peale, and Cara Ober.
Rice’s large mixed-media installations tackle issues of white supremacy and privilege through personal narratives, historic family accounts, and collective stories centered around media, government policy, and economic programs. Exhibited at The Peale, the oldest museum building in the USA, Rice’s work engages directly with Baltimore’s history of inequity through hand cut maps, immersive collages, and provocative text.
The Preserve the Baltimore Uprising Project: A People’s Archive
Friday, February 5 • 1 p.m.
presented by AIA Baltimore
Dr. Denise Meringolo describes the processes, values, and ethical considerations underlying the creation of Preserve the Baltimore Uprising
This program is hosted on Zoom. Upon registering you will receive an email confirmation and a Zoom link. If you do not receive a link, please contact [email protected]. If you do not contact us at least 1 hour prior to the start of the program, we cannot guarantee admittance.
Virtual Histories are back in 2021! The Baltimore Architecture Foundation (BAF) and Baltimore Heritage present a series of 30-minute live virtual tours and presentations focusing on Baltimore architecture, preservation, and history.
Tickets are donation based. We encourage you to give what you can to support BAF and Baltimore Heritage. Your support helps us make up for lost tour and program revenue from COVID-19 and create more virtual programs like this.
Preserve the Baltimore Uprising began as a digital repository designed to preserve and make accessible original content captured and created by individual community members, grassroots organizations, and witnesses to the protests that followed the death of Freddie Gray on April 19, 2015. It is a people’s archive. For the people. By the people. Owned by all.
Public Historians strive to be both responsible and responsive. As scholars, we are responsible for upholding the highest standards of intellectual inquiry. As public servants, we are committed to responding to the needs, interests, and desires of our audiences and stakeholders. Sometimes it is difficult to balance these two demands. In this talk, Dr. Denise Meringolo, Professor and Director of Public History at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County, describes the processes, values, and ethical considerations underlying the creation of Preserve the Baltimore Uprising, a crowd-sourced digital collection.
Pouring Light | Exhibition Opening
Friday, February 5 • 5-9pm + Saturday, February 6 – Sunday, February 7 • 12-4pm | Ongoing through March 13
@ Carroll Mansion
Featured Artists: Julia Glatfelter and Jaz Erenberg
How do you view Baltimore? Our perspective impacts how we speak, act and live in our city. Your viewpoint of “The Greatest City in America” greatly impacts your experience of it. In this exhibition, images are repeated. The same people and places are portrayed multiple times to contrast against each other and show the array of choices we have. We have a choice by which we view our home, this Charm City. We choose how we view one another. Artists Julia Glatfelter and Jaz Erenberg believe that our perspective can actually change our reality. Exhibition on view February 5 – March 14, 2021
This exhibition honors the impact of Baltimore Ceasefire Volunteers. Baltimore Ceasefire is a powerful force for peace in our city. After the loss of a life due to violence, Ceasefire volunteers show up on the scene to “pour light and love into the space.” This body of work honors their impact in valuing every life. While fatal numbers climb, Ceasefire Ambassadors are showing up, spending time and blessing the streets of our city.
BRIGHT
Opening day viewing 1-5 p.m. | Opening Reception 6-8 p.m. (reception will be limited capacity, masks required) | Ongoing through March 20
@ Creative Alliance
Within the very fabric of the Black portraiture genre, a rebellious spirit thrives. Beautiful images exude bright colors, ideas, and histories that can only be fully realized when told through the consciousness of Black artists themselves. Stories are accurately extrapolated when presented by those with an understanding of the nuances at play. Black narratives must be told using the first-hand experience as the cicerone. The artworks in BRIGHT provide new contexts to Black life and serve as a brave choice by these artists to push back against mainstream portrayals of Black bodies.
BRIGHT brings together ten Black American artists to Creative Alliance’s main gallery. Their dazzling works showcase an authentic depiction of Black life, forcing viewers to see Blackness in a new light.
EXHIBITION ARTISTS:
Ambrose | Marie Charlotte Amegah | Destiny Belgrave | Michael A. Booker | Schroeder Cherry | Andrew Gray | David Ibata | Jabari C. Jefferson | Megan Lewis (photo) | Arin Mitchell
In Focus: Representations of Black Womanhood | Virtual Opening Reception
Monday, February 8 • 7-8 p.m.
presented by UMCP Stamp Gallery
Opening Reception on Instagram Live
Free and Open to the Public
Information at stamp.umd.edu/gallery
IG: @stampgalleryumd
This spring the Stamp Gallery at the University of Maryland, College Park, presents In Focus: Representations of Black Womanhood, an exhibition of artwork to inspire dialogue and reflection on identity. On view February 8 through March 27, 2021, the exhibition features ten artworks by three emerging and mid-career artists. In dual contradiction and in spite of the limitations associated with ‘black’ and ‘woman’ and the other identities embodied in each individual, André Terrel Jackson, Akea Brionne, and Sadia Alao seek to answer these questions for themselves and diversify the narrative of what it means to be a black woman in today’s America.
Curated by Brianna Nuñez
About the Artists:
Sadia Alao is a recent graduate of the University of Maryland where she studied Marketing and Theater. She is a spoken word artist, director, writer, actor, and so much more. Her work involves uplifting and creating space for marginalized lives. Sadia plans to head her own multimedia production company highlighting the successes and narratives of people of color.
Akea Brionne Brown is a visual journalist, photographer, writer, curator, and researcher whose personal work investigates the implications of historical racial and social structures in relation to the development of contemporary black life and identity within America. With a particular focus on the ways in which history influences the contemporary cultural milieu of the American black middle class, she explores current political and social themes, as they relate to historical forms of oppression, discrimination, and segregation in American history.
Mining personal history, André Terrel Jackson is able to use poetry, weaving, sculpture, apparel and performance to spark conversation about difficult issues related to identity. André uses language, visual/literal/metaphorical, to center the voices and images of blackness. Intersectionality is paramount, and influences the use of materials, which take the artist from the craft store, to the hardware store, from the quirky, to the fine and luxurious. The mixing, and juxtaposing, of materials lend humor and beauty to otherwise grave topics.
Calls for Entry // Opportunities
Submit Your Art
deadline ongoing
sponsored by Busboys and Poets
Busboys and Poets, a community gathering place, restaurant and cultural hub for artists, activists, writers, thinkers and dreamers, is looking for visual art in all media to display at the new locations opening in Baltimore on 33rd and St. Paul St., and in Columbia Md on Merriweather Post Drive.
Artists may submit up to 10 original works to be reviewed, ranging from but not limited to drawings, painting, photography, sculpture, mixed media, assemblage, fiber, quilts, etc. Standing sculpture should be no larger than 24” in height. We are also open to sculptural forms that can be hung safely from the walls without brackets. The sculptures can also be placed on overhead shelves at the Baltimore location.
Once the work is selected, images will be on display at the location for up to six months. For two dimension art, it must arrive wired, ready to hang, or with materials that will adhere to the wall without stripping the paint. The work can be offered for sale. Busboys and Poets takes no commission.
The preferred submission process is online at busboysandpoets.com. Click About, then Art, then Art Submission form and fill in your information. Please list titles, sizes, media and prices on all submission. Be sure and add YOUR CONTACT information.
Questions: email [email protected]
Artists should be prepared to assist in exhibition installation and deinstallation (early morning at the location prior to when the restaurant opens to the public).
THEMES: Art images reflecting life in the city, family, portraits, whimsy, abstraction, social uplift and life experiences within diverse cultures are encouraged for submission
Also see the Busboys and Poets EMERGE and SEE exhibition art call for images that reflect social justice, COVID-19 and community transformation.
Artists selected will be notified by email at least two weeks in advance of installation.
Dates of Exhibition: Beginning March 29, 2021 (Opening of the Baltimore location)
And Summer, 2021 Opening of Columbia, MD location
Submission Deadline: Ongoing
Creative Capital 2020 Creative Capital Awards.
Applying is free, open to all disciplines, and can be found here.
The Creative Capital Award grants up to $50,000 in project funding, supplemented by an additional $50,000 in career development services, for a total value of $100,000. Continuing its commitment to supporting groundbreaking work, this year’s applications are open to all artistic disciplines. The award recipients will be chosen by a multidisciplinary panel composed of past awardees, expert curators, producers, editors, and other arts professionals in a thorough, multi-step review process.
A selection of past awardees include Kyle Abraham, Sanford Biggers, Zach Blas, CAConrad, Heather Dewey-Hagborg, Johanna Fateman, Yance Ford, LaToya Ruby Frazier, Theaster Gates, Wes Hurley, Raja Feather Kelly, Daresha Kyi, Lynn Hershman Leeson, Simone Leigh, Shana Moulton, Eileen Myles, Okwui Okpokwasili, and more. Explore the full list of 700 past Creative Capital Awardees here.
Creative Capital seeks to support exceptionally bold and innovative work, and as such the selection process is extremely competitive. Applicants will be required to provide a short- and long-form description, answer a series of questions regarding their work, and provide a work sample. Applicants will then be selected to proceed to the second, and, finally, third rounds of consideration.
More information regarding the process, including advice from previous Award recipients and jurors, can be found here.
Since its inception in 1999, Creative Capital has committed to taking risks on artists by supporting bold, challenging, and genre-stretching ideas through funding, counsel, gatherings, and career development services. Its pioneering venture philanthropy approach helps artists working in all creative disciplines realize their artistic visions and build more sustainable practices.
In the past twenty years, Creative Capital has committed over $45 million in project funding and advisory support to 561 projects representing 700 artists and has worked with more than 18,000 artists in over 800 creative communities across the country.
More information on the most recent Creative Capital Awards, announced earlier this year, is available here.
Kuumba Showcase | Call for Black Vocalists
deadline February 5
sponsored by Creative Alliance
Are you a Black vocalist? Consider adding your voice to the collective of voices in our Kuumba Showcase! This year’s theme, “Lift Every Voice,” explores the importance of voice and vocal expression in Black Liberation movements. In appreciation for all accepted submissions, we are giving vocalists a modest honorarium of $100.
2020/2021 Young Playwrights Festival | Call for Entry
deadline February 28
sponsored by Baltimore Center Stage
YPF is our longest running learning program that encourages expression and creativity in students across the state. Each Spring, we invite young artists in grades K-12 to send in their new written work. We receive hundreds of plays from participants in our residencies, and many more from students across Maryland. Up to six pieces are chosen to receive a professional virtual production produced by Baltimore Center Stage. All 6 YPF student artists are assigned a professional mentor to help them refine and edit their work before being presented. The event will be streamed on our Facebook page and YouTube channel with closed captioning provided. This year’s YPF will take place in late Spring 2021, exact date to be announced.
For this year’s YPF Open Call process, we will be using a submission management application called Submittable. This means that young artists will be using the same new work application process as Baltimore Center Stage’s professional playwrights. Students will also have to make an account with Submittable in order to send in their work, which can be used later on in any of their artistic endeavors.
Sidewalk Poetry Contest | Call for Submissions
deadline February 27
sponsored by Takoma Park Arts
The City of Takoma Park is seeking entries of short original poems by local residents to be stamped in sidewalks in a new public art project. Contestants don’t need to be published poets. Just write a poem and enter it! Please read the rules and complete this form to enter. Contestants will be notified by March 31 about their status after the judging is completed.
Contest Rules:
Only current Takoma Park residents may apply. City of Takoma Park employees aren’t eligible to apply.
Contestants may submit up to two poems in English or Spanish using this form. Poems in Spanish must include the English translation. Poems must be entirely the original work of the contestant.
Poems must be 5 lines or less with a maximum of 30 characters per line including spaces between words. Longer poems will not be considered. Titles aren’t required but count as a line. City staff may choose to stamp poems without titles.
Sidewalk poems will be seen in local neighborhoods and should be appropriate for people of all ages and backgrounds. Poems should avoid overtly political or religious topics, and no profanity is allowed.
Children may submit their own original poems with parental or guardian consent and should include their age in their submission.
A selection committee will choose the winners or have the discretion to choose no winning entries. All decisions made by the committee will be final. Winners will receive a $100 award and retain all copyrights to their poems. Winners must grant the City permission to feature their poems in any promotion for the project. A poetry reading by the winners also may be organized by City staff.
Poems will be stamped in sidewalks at the City’s discretion when staff time and funding allow. A winning entry doesn’t guarantee that a poem will be stamped in a sidewalk. The locations for sidewalk poems will be decided solely by City staff with every effort to locate poems across the city.
For any questions, email Arts and Humanities Coordinator Brendan Smith at [email protected].
Decontexts | Call for Entry
deadline March 7
sponsored by LoosenArt
The beginning of modernity in the artistic field is marked by the introduction of a perspective vision, thanks to which the figures, within a planar space, are arranged according to an order of depth of field. The object acquires an “internal space”, and with this it takes autonomy from the external space and is no longer an object in a space, but is itself the creation of its own space of representation: it becomes removable, and can be displayed in any place. The act of extracting an object / subject, isolated or inserted in imaginary spaces, imposes an evaluative approach oriented on the intrinsic meaning – and aesthetic – of what is exposed, and with it imposes questions such as “how much context is needed for us to categorize an object? How much can be taken away before an object completely loses its identity, before it truly becomes something else?”.
Flora | Call for Submissions
deadline March 7
sponsored by SE Center for Photography
Artists throughout the ages have been drawn to the vast and varied world of flora. What moves you? Do you celebrate the essence of beauty or strive to heighten recognition of the perilous path of our environment? Are you inspired by a single bloom or a profusion of blossoms in a lush bouquet, enchanted gardens manicured or messy, plants endangered or invasive, carefully cultivated or sown by nature, bursting forth or shriveling on a vine?
Our Juror, Wendi Schneider is a Denver-based visual artist widely known for her ongoing series of hand-gilded photographs, States of Grace – illuminated impressions of grace in the natural world. Drawn to the serenity she finds in the sinuous elegance of organic forms, she embraces photography to preserve vanishing moments of beauty in our vulnerable environment.
35-40 Selected images will hang in the SE Center’s main gallery space for approximately one month with the opportunity to be invited for a solo show at a later date. In addition, selected images are featured in the SE Center social media accounts (FB, IG, Twitter) and an archived, online slide show. A video walkthrough of each exhibition is also featured and archived.
This week: Evan Woodward's museum, Blaze Star, John Waters turns 78, Juius Wilson at AVAM, Megan Lewis, Joyce J. Scott, MICA UP/Start Venture Winner Announced, and RuPaul winners to race at Baltimore Pride, and more!
In Conjunction with BmoreArt’s C+C Exhibit featuring Fostel’s charcoal drawings of women’s bedrooms, a conversation with the Co-Director of the Baltimore Abortion Fund
This Week: MICA Community Art & Service Program exhibition, In the Stacks performance at Peabody Library, City of Artists I closing reception at Connect + Collect, Mari Black at Manor Mill, Open Works yard sale, screening of Black Printmakers of Washington DC at Smithsonian Anacostia, and more!
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!
