BmoreArt

Hamilton, a 37-year-old graphic designer, and Benevento, a 40-year-old sculptor and photographer, met in 2009 when Hamilton rented a studio at Current Space’s first location on S. Calvert Street. Four years earlier, Benevento, a recent MICA graduate, fortuitously encountered the artist co-op when it was recruiting new members. Both Benevento—who has been an artist, collaborator, and co-director at Current Space for almost as long as it’s been around—and Hamilton explain that they were inspired by Current Space’s vivacity and fluid approach to artistic alliance. “We fell in love with Current Space, and then with each other,” Hamilton laughs.

Over the last 19 and a half years, this passion has compelled Benevento, in particular, to dedicate much of his time and career to the gallery. His commitment was particularly significant when Current Space moved locations between 2009-10. Often an uphill battle, the transition demanded a diverse skill set, constant collaboration with other artists (including Monique Crabb and Andrew Liang, who were co-directors with Benevento at the time), and a glass-half-full perspective.

Like the scores of artists and creatives who have been involved with Current Space over the years, both Hamilton and Benevento are tenacious optimists whose faith in the art space has helped fuel its metamorphosis. Particularly when navigating bureaucratic logistics (such as purchasing the building from the city and getting a liquor license), the co-directors’ combined willpower has made the gallery’s most recent evolution possible.

As it’s grown, Current Space has become home to an array of artists, designers, curators, performers, and more. “Lots of people [have been] involved at different points,” Hamilton remarks.

As significant to Current Space’s legacy as its collaborative history is its malleability. Much of the art space’s success can be attributed to a philosophy Benevento and Hamilton have resolutely upheld, one that involves not letting “too-big ambitions” keep them from “moving forward and adapting” to unforeseen circumstances. Their embrace of the new and novel is impressive, as is their calm-and-collected approach to confronting challenges head on.

Hamilton and Benevento’s collaborative, assertive patience has been invaluable to Current Space’s functionality and ability to provide a platform for networking, education, and communal innovation. The art space’s kaleidoscopic energy, fundamental to growing its web of members and visitors, is compelling. It’s a tribute to not only the gallery’s flexibility, but also Hamilton and Benevento’s efforts to give back to Baltimore, and the communities that have defined the heart of Current Space for the past 20 years.

SUBJECT: Julianne Hamilton (37), Michael Benevento (40)
WEARING: Sweaters! Julianne’s was recently purchased from Society Mano, an ethical fashion platform that supports female artisans, at the American Craft Council’s annual American Craft Made Baltimore convention. Michael’s is from a thrift store years ago, and is his trademark look in the colder months of the year.
PLACE: Current Space, courtyard
WEBSITE: www.currentspace.com
INSTAGRAM: @currentspace, @juliannedhamilton, @beneventomichael
UPCOMING EVENTS: The weekend-long 20th Anniversary Festival: August 23 – August 25.

Isa Gold: What do you believe is art’s role and function in local and global communities?

Michael: We are about to celebrate our 20th Anniversary this weekend (August 23 – 25), and I still have a hard time with questions like this. It’s like asking what’s the point of anything other than consuming and burning calories. I think art is what we look back at in order to get a glimpse or try to understand what a society was thinking about at a particular moment. Individually each work might be a narrow representation, but aggregated you begin to get a broader view of trends, beliefs, desires, fears, technology, context… It can also move people, trigger memories, connect ideas, and influence choices. You may see yourself in it or someone you know, or something completely unfamiliar and new. It’s a way to see someone else’s experiences.

If you could build your own museum, what would you create?

Julianne: We visited Mass MoCA over the winter and I liked their model of long-term loans on some works rather than permanent acquisitions as a way to stay focused on contemporary artwork. In Havana, we visited La Fábrica de Arte Cubano and were very inspired by that. It’s a large converted factory with several galleries, multiple performance and event spaces, and spots to grab a drink or bite interspersed throughout the maze-like space. I loved how it was full of both locals and tourists every night. What we’re doing at Current Space feels similar, on a smaller scale—a space where people can view the exhibitions in the two galleries and check out wide-ranging programming from music shows to poetry readings to DJ parties in the courtyard, while having a fresh watermelon juice drink.

If I had unlimited resources, I’d want to build something with qualities of both in Baltimore—a global destination where artists are supported and the arts are considered an unmissable part of any trip to Baltimore. And where visual arts are a major part of nightlife. This city still has a lot of vacancy and unused spaces. Something large-scale like that feels possible here. In a lot of ways, it would be an expansion upon what we’re already doing at Current Space.

Where do you go when you need to clear your head? What are some of your favorite spots in Baltimore?

Julianne: We often walk the loop of Druid Hill Park behind Woodberry or along Stony Run. I can tell when Michael has a lot on his mind because his pace will match his thoughts. Honestly, to really clear my head, I need to leave Baltimore though. We travel or go camping whenever we can. Nothing beats Assateague for me. Being away also inspires a lot of the ideas that we bring back to Current Space. When we were planning the courtyard, we were inspired by things like the ruin bars in Budapest, beer gardens in Berlin, and adaptive reuse in Panama City.

Locally, some of my favorite places are coffee shops and brunch spots. Because Current Space is typically open at night, we go out for breakfast more than dinner and especially love Chuck’s Trading Post. But I’m also looking forward to the winter when our outdoor space is closed and we’ll be able to go back to other spots that keep the same Wednesday to Saturday hours we do like Comptoir du Vin and so many other galleries and venues. It’s hard to get out at night when we have our own events going on.

We’ve made Current Space into one of my favorite spots too—green and lush, a hidden garden in the middle of Downtown. I love being there in the morning when it’s quiet and seeing migrating birds pass through. Al Schatz, who often runs sound here, even spotted a rabbit last week and we can’t imagine where it came from!

You mentioned how, over the last couple of decades, you have focused increasingly on managing Current Space rather than developing your individual art practice. How has this shift affected you and your creative work? Do you miss working on solo projects?

Michael: In many ways the space has become my creative practice, like a big living sculpture. In some ways less visual—like designing the usage and systems of the spaces, or curating the programing. More physical ways have been building out the space. I felt like an anthropologist going through these old buildings, trying to understand how they were used, the existing mechanical systems, which aspects of the space to reuse and which to erase.

Our first location was a narrow 7-story office building with a ground level retail space, a block from the Gallery Mall. The upper floors were mostly salmon with seafoam trim, at some point it looked like some of the floors were renovated to semi gloss antique white. The ground level became the gallery and the offices became studios. Above the 3rd floor was vacant for fire code requirements, since there was only one functional egress. At the time, the Co-Directors were Hans Petrich, Andy Cook, Monique and I—we sawzalled all of the partition walls out on one of the upper floors and reassembled them to build a pavilion for an exhibition at Artscape, called The Dilapidated Reanimated Expo in 2006. The vacant offices on the upper floors were also good as small sound separated chambers, which Double Dagger used to record one of their albums. The first couple exhibitions I organized, Under Construction, Automation Constipation, and Hacking Utopias were all inspired by our relation to the building, urban renewal, gentrification, adaptive reuse, or the context of being a DIY art space disguised as an office building next to the mall and main tourist area.

At one point we pressure washed all the feces out of the alley and threw a festival called Current Canyon Festival. I was inspired by the outdoor markets in Mexico City, spanning a network of colored tarps between our building and the neighboring vacant buildings that were even taller. The tarps created giant blue gels when the sun shone through them. Admittedly, I also just liked climbing on stuff. The last exhibit we did at that space was called Abandon Ship, where artists installed works to be demolished with the building.

When Current Space first relocated to 421 N. Howard St in 2010, everything was painted a bright semi gloss efficiency green with brown shag carpet glued over the terrazzo floors, dusty snot rockets and pencils dangling from the drop ceiling. It had been vacant for at least a year before us, the breaker box listed the rooms as offices for a construction temp agency and military recruitment. I remember we found a vintage bondage porno mag tucked into one of the many tanker desks, and a wooden box rolodex of potential military recruits typed on index cards. The basement had vinyl diner benches repurposed from the restaurant that originally inhabited the ground floor prior, and a bunch of van benches—some arranged around a pool table and others in private little nooks like temporary living spaces. There were a bunch of old army green lockers, one was still locked, like someone never returned from work that day.

This building was a lot more beat up, with broken windows and a leaky roof that needed constant patching—many of the buildings on the block had been vacant for twenty-plus years and we watched the roofs collapse around us over the next few years. The space was rebuilt by a bunch of artists volunteering their time to make it happen. We installed doors, lock sets, faucets, and lights we had salvaged from the previous building we occupied that was slated for demolition—covering more and more of the efficiency green with the cheapest contractor grade paint we could find, because we needed tens of gallons to try and cover everything. The color was called “Misty Moonstone” a light gray that appears white, but helps conceal grime and makes artworks look brighter in person. Over the last few years we have been gradually switching everything to Flat 400 White, which is more consistent for touch ups and easier to color balance in photos.

Early in the pandemic we built out the outdoor space more using recycled materials and chunks of the neighborhood. I re-paved the sinkhole in our lot with the tiled entryway from one of the buildings across the street that burned down several years ago. The benches are all made from 2 x 4 precut studs, recycled from past art handling gigs building walls and tearing them down after art shows. The garden bed retaining walls are all made from chunks of the Mayfair’s brick exterior—the historic theater across the street that was partially demolished—and chunks of concrete that were extracted from the basement here. There were mini concrete foundations for machinery in the basement that were abandoned in place—I drilled a grid of holes and filled them with non-explosive expanding concrete to extract 12” solid concrete blocks.

The giant Paulownia tree or Empress Tree was just a spherical shrub when we first relocated here—it is commonly seen growing through parking lots or sides of buildings, but also tree lined driveways in botanical gardens. The dried shells were historically used as packing materials and spilled all over the country. We pruned it to look like broccoli when we first relocated here, and it soon surpassed the height of the historic buildings that used to surround it. The leaves are massive and it has clusters of golden stemmed purple flowers in the spring. The resilience of the Paulownia and Ailanthus bursting through concrete and brick, thriving in the rubble, inspired me. I think when all the Ailanthus saplings were wiped out during the demolition next door, it inspired us to green our own space. The banana plants and elephant ears reminded me of Houston, where I grew up. The fig tree was grown from a cutting from a family tree.

As far a solo practice I do have a studio, but I mostly use it as an office. I take photos but I haven’t figured out what to do with them all.

How does the Baltimore community inspire, and/or how has it impacted, your vision of the future of Current Space?

Michael: There are a lot of amazing artists in Baltimore. We are just trying to equip the space to try to keep up with everything. Current Space has two galleries, an outdoor performance space, visual art and music studios, and a cocktail bar with food. The Baltimore arts community has always been very supportive of one another. Many Baltimore artists, in addition to their creative practice, have also taken on the role of connector. Andrew Shenker organizes a recurring variety show called Crosscurrence, which includes readings, video, theater, music, and more. Jake Budenz and dave ring organize a monthly queer literary series called Proxima Arcanum. Garden Hours is a bi-weekly DJ residency with JaySwann, but he also brings in another guest DJ each time. Many of the music shows are organized by local bands that want to help support a friend’s touring act or record release show by bringing their audience to the lineup.

What is your go-to comfort food?

Julianne: All through high school and college I worked at a wonderful produce stand and I love in-season fruit and vegetables, but mac and cheese will always be my go-to when I’m really looking for comfort. If I’m feeling ambitious, it’s my Mum-mum’s recipe which calls for the biggest elbow noodles you can find, some nice cheese and at least a couple slices of American cheese or a dollop of Cheese Wiz for that ideal meltiness. Otherwise, I have a soft spot for the classic blue box.

Food is an important part of feeling at ease. It’s hard to focus and take things in when you’re hungry. We actually just added a food program at Current Space. Dallas Warren has put together a nice menu with things like garlic-crusted kimchi grilled cheese, pickled vegetable onigiri, and cold sesame noodles. There aren’t tons of food options open at night, so we wanted to be sure people didn’t feel they had to leave when they were hungry.

How do you go about curating shows and developing programming for Current Space?

Michael: Current Space has a long history, so we have been able to work with a lot of different artists, organizers, and curators, and build relationships—seeing what new projects people are working on. Sometimes Julianne and I do studio visits and curate shows ourselves and other times we curate shows with other artists who are part of the space—most recently You Wu, Reuben Francois, and Elena Johnston. We also take proposals for events and group exhibitions from other artists and curators. We have also worked with other organizations to host programs with overlapping interests like Black Cherry Puppet Theater, High Zero, MDFF, The Baker Artist Awards, The Enoch Pratt, Bromo Arts District, etc.

We intentionally plan exhibitions to be varied from one another, and now having two galleries we can match up exhibits with different audiences to cross-pollinate. Having galleries, an outdoor performance space, studios, and a bar has created an ecosystem for artists to be exposed to different practices, talk about art, collaborate, influence, and inspire each other.

Occasionally we have programming meetings to look at proposals and brainstorm with volunteers and studio members. The monthly Pecha Kucha lecture series was something Sophie Maguire introduced at the meeting, where we invite several people to show twenty slides for twenty seconds each and talk about a project or aspect of their work, which has included scientists, builders, artists, architects, poets, non-profits, etc. We have a number of annual events like ATP (A Ten-minute-one-time-only-band Production) and Fantasy Machine—an experimental fashion show that Meg Beck organizes in October.

How do you envision Current Space influencing change, now and in the future, in Baltimore? In other (art) communities?

Michael: Like how warehouses were repurposed as artist studios and venues, I think we are seeing the need for office spaces and malls decline, which could create a similar opportunity for artists to reuse these spaces in creative ways. In 2004, Current Space’s first location was a vacant office building with ground level retail—that was part of a larger block wide demolition redevelopment project. A combination of city agencies put out a call for an artist group to occupy the building—rent-free—in the interim before demolition, which was initially planned for 6 months but became over 5 years. The initial group of 14 artists included Alyssa Dennis, Hans Petrich, Seth Adelsberger, Erin Fostel, and many others. The groundlevel was converted into a gallery and the upper floors were used as studios. Monthly studio dues covered basic operational costs like utilities, insurance, maintenance, and building modifications. This model could be replicated, Baltimore has a huge resource of artists that could be amplified and cultivated. Baltimore has tons of vacant offices, malls, and warehouses. Why not let artists use these spaces to create art and produce public exhibitions? Even better would be to give them a budget.

In 2010, we relocated to a similar situation with a vacant city-owned office space, formerly a construction temp agency on the westside of downtown, near the H&H, which at the time was another huge art space, that was influential to me. The H&H was an interesting model; it was a large warehouse where artists leased out each floor collectively and lived around the perimeter of each floor, creating a shared central gallery or performance space; rents were also subsidized by the cellular towers on the roof. When the city put up most of the buildings on our block for developers to bid, they selected our proposal so that we could stay permanently.

While a proposal for luxury housing checks the boxes for financing feasibility and tax revenue—in a shrinking city—cultural amenities increase the quality of life and create another reason to stay, move here, or visit. For us this was a transformative shift in our relationship with the city, we became a permanent asset. We were no longer waiting to be displaced again, no longer on a month-to-month lease occupying free vacant space in exchange for making the vacant block more palatable for developers. We became the developer, the community stakeholder, the neighborhood constituent, a permanent asset to the city.