An Insider's Look at Baltimore
Fast Facts
Baltimore: Dining in the City of Steamed Crabs
Haunted Places in Baltimore
Inexpensive Things To Do In Baltimore
The Baltimore Art Scene
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The Baltimore Art Scene
In mid-town, Mount Vernon is the neighborhood where you can find the Walters Art Museum. This museum emphasizes ancient art, and its extensive collection of Egyptian, Roman, Greek, Islamic and Medieval European work embraces almost 50 centuries of human artistic endeavor. A popular display in the gallery is the treasury room, which will please women with Tiffany brooches and Faberge eggs, and men with an armory filled with swords, maces and suits of armor. It is also here at the Walter's Art Museum that you can see a Greek sarcophagus where one of the carved heads decorating the piece resembles the King of Rock and Roll himself, Elvis Presley!
Around the corner from the Walters Art Museum is The Contemporary Museum, which focuses on postmodern art. Multi-media works are the coin of this realm, and the works on display are as intellectually challenging as they are pleasing to the eye. The museum also sponsors temporary art projects and displays around the city that are specific to the site they are at. That is what makes The Contemporary Museum's Mount Vernon location an ideal place to start a citywide tour of cutting-edge art.
On the south side of the Inner Harbor, at the foot of Federal Hill Park, is the American Visionary Art Museum. "Visionary Art" in this sense means work created by people that have no professional training and use ordinary objects, as well as traditional media, to express their deeply emotional, and often mystical, beliefs about love, God, humanity, and the universe at large. The AVAM is home to North America's largest collection of astounding, beautiful, and fascinating interpretive works. The permanent works are supplemented by many temporary displays with themes such as "Angels and Other Aliens" and "Treasures of the Soul."
The C. Grimaldis Gallery and the Craig Flinner Gallery are two of the finest private commercial art galleries in the downtown area. The C. Grimaldis Gallery (410-539-1080) specializes in contemporary sculpture and the Craig Flinner Gallery (410-727-1863) displays antique prints and vintage posters. Most of Baltimore's many private commercial art galleries are situated along North Charles Street.
On the first Thursday of every month, the Charles Street galleries join together to host First Thursday, which is an open house and cocktail party that allows the public to sample fine wine and hors d'ourves as they stroll along checking out the galleries. The Walters Art Gallery and the Baltimore Museum of Art join in on First Thursday by extending their hours and offering free admission on these special nights. The Enoch Pratt Free Library also sponsors musical events and such for the festivities. The library is located near Charles Street on Cathedral Street.
In the city during July? You should check out ArtScape which is a three-day festival of the arts where four blocks near the Maryland Institute College of Art are devoted to the arts. Here you can enjoy work from artists of all kinds; painters, jewelers, sculptors, craftspeople, poets, musicians, actors and just about anyone that follows a muse. ArtScape is a celebration of beautiful things and wonderful people but of course, what festival would be complete without great food.
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