Tomorrow: Baker Artist Awards Closing, Pissed Jeans

One of the best things about living in Baltimore, and perhaps the major reason we love it so dearly, is the ability to go from something very highbrow and sophisticated to something decidedly lowbrow with absolutely no transition in between.

That’s exactly how our night looks to be shaping up tomorrow, when we’ll be going directly from one of the BMA’s “late night” parties over to the Golden West for an actual late night party. There’s 2 to 1 odds that the phrase “Oh you think you fancy, huh?” will come into play at some point tomorrow.

Pissed Jeans plays the Golden West tomorrow.

If you haven’t been to one of the Baltimore Museum of Art’s late night events yet, you’re absolutely missing out on one of the best things in all of Baltimore. The museum has been throwing Saturday night parties at the close of each of its special exhibitions recently, and each one has been bigger and more fun than the last with food, music, cash bar, and free or very cheap admission. Tomorrow’s event is free, and will have a distinctly Baltimorean feel to it as it marks the closing of the Baker Artist Awards exhibit.

This year’s winners were, of course, Gary Kachadourian, Audrey Chen, and Shodekeh, who will be joined by several more familiar names including Ellen Cherry, Justin Sirois, and the Copycat Theater.

But we can only pretend to be rich and classy and sophisticated for so long. By the time this party is over we’ll be more than ready to hie to the Golden West for Sub Pop’s Pissed Jeans. What’s Pissed Jeans? It’s a big dirty dick that fucks you in the ear. It’s the kind of band that makes beer drip from the ceiling and nice things get broken. It’s the sound of America falling apart at the seams.

It’s also Dana’s birthday. Happy birthday, Dana.

Temporary Home @ Guest Spot’s Inaugural Opening Tonight

There’s a new art gallery opening tonight. From 7-10 pm, Guest Spot will open its doors to the public for the first time with its inaugural show, Temporary Home, which is curated by Carl Gunhouse and features the work of Becky Alprin, City Blossoms, Jason Hughes, John Lehr, and Christine Rogers.

Early buzz has it that this will be a fine show and an exciting gallery.

John Lehr's 2008 piece, Nuggets, is an example of the work on display in the Temporary Home exhibit.

We’d love to tell you more about it, but reading through some of this gallery’s copy left us pulling our hair and yelling ENGLISH MOTHERFUCKER! DO YOU SPEAK IT?! If you’d like to know more, you can go over to the Guest Spot website (which is actually a very well designed site) and sift through many paragraphs like this:

“The unique curatorial program focuses on ideas surrounding impermanence and liminal context within a home dwelling. Artists and curators will have the opportunity to install work in a mixed use space, thus challenging the singularity of commercial space and exploring the delicate relationship between space and purpose.”

or this:

“Guest Spot’s focus is to create a new curatorial program that addresses current ideas of exhibiting art through rehabilitation of spatial contexts. The core programmatic theme is a re-appropriation of rigid societal norms of space utilization to more thoroughly examine the concept of the ”American Home”. Its program will include artists whose works deals with concepts relating to impermanence, ephemerality, and liminality.”

We suspect it may just be easier to go down there and have a look-see for ourselves. By the end of tonight, we may not understand the mission statement, but at least we’ll know what Marcellus Wallace looks like.

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Guest Spot is located at 1826 Fleet Street in Fell’s Point.

Second Annual Pigment Opening @ Gallery 788 Tonight

We’re going back to Pigtown tonight. It’s been more than a year since we’ve gone to Pigtown for anything, and the last time we did it was for the first Pigment opening. It’s funny; we said then that Pigtown should hold more cool events to lure people from the rest of the city into the neighborhood once in a while, and here we are a year later having not been back once.

Last year’s Pigment opening was duly impressive. Gallery 788 had the walls overflowing with great work, and the floor overflowing (literally, people were spilling out onto the sidewalk) with some of Baltimore’s most creative and stylish people. Cans of Boh were flowing and records were spinning, and we even managed to score a framed drawing for a ridiculously cheap price which still holds a prominent place on our bookshelves.

We say show up early, because pieces are going to sell tonight. With a 6pm start time you’ve got four full hours to enjoy the art and the company, and figure out which of the eventual afterparties you’d like to get in on. There’s bound to be no shortage of celebrations, as today also happens to be Cinco de Mayo. Or you can do like us and eschew drinking holidays completely, and drink bourbon at home instead of tequila downtown.

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Gallery 788 is at 788 Washington Blvd. in Pigtown.

Super Art Fight 9 @ Ottobar Tonight

We haven’t made it out to a Super Art Fight yet. We’re overdue. Way overdue. It’s been our understanding that it gets bigger, better, and badass-er with each installment, so with the approach of their 9th battle, it’s safe to say that it’s going to be the best one yet.

Here at the Baltimore Chop, we like to try to give you the dope on events happening in town, mixed with a little opinion, but sometimes the facts are hard to come by. Some bars and restaurants still don’t have their own websites. Some bands rely on abandoned Myspace profiles as their whole web presence. This is not the case with Super Art Fight.

The tag team tournament is only part of the pandemonium in store at SAF9 at the Ottobar tonight. 9 pm doors.

They blog the hell out of their events. If you want to know what to expect tonight, you can read all about it on the SAF blog, which has no less than 8 separate blog posts about tonight’s event. Hell, that’s almost too much. With all that info out there, we can’t even pretend to try to break it down into one little preview post.

Once you click over there, you’ll see the same kind of detailed posts highlighting SAF taking its show on the road, too. Super Art Fight-of-mass-destruction-program-related-activities have taken place all over the world (from Virginia to Connecticut), and we’re greatly heartened to see Baltimore’s quirky and creative side so well-represented abroad. Tonight the Ottobar, tomorrow, to infinity and beyoooonddd…” Or something like that.

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Ottobar is located at 2549 N. Howard St. All Ages.

Ann D. Schuler Retrospective @ Schuler School of Fine Arts Today

It’s easy to get a little cynical about Station North sometimes. Even with all of the success stories in that neighborhood in recent years, it can be tempting to look around at all the still-crummy warehouse lofts, the custom bike shops, fashion-obsessed co-eds and sometimes obscure and inaccessible music scene and think “Welp, the City built the hipsters a nice little playground here.”

Indeed, it’s not difficult to forget about the higher end of culture in the neighborhood. There’s The Charles Theater, of course, and the everyman, and even the Meyerhoff and the Lyric between Mount Royal and North Avenues. And then there’s Station North’s other art school.

The Schuler School of Fine Arts hosts a retrospective of its late founder's works today. 2-6 pm.

The Schuler School of Fine Arts has been a fixture in Station North since before there was a Station North. Well before. Just look at the building. You don’t grow that much ivy overnight, and for more than 50 years the school on Lafayette Avenue has been a cloister dedicated to the study, admiration and emulation of the styles and techniques of the old masters.

At today’s exhibit (which also ran yesterday) you won’t be seeing any paint splatters or lines and shapes. No half-cocked political statements. No absurdist riffs on absurdity for the sake of irony. No silent, endlessly looping video installations. Dan Deacon’s not hosting any dance parties at Schuler.

The Chop has walked past the Schuler School hundreds of times. Possibly into the thousands. We’ve always sort of thought of it as that closed up little building where a few people go to paint so many flowers and fruit bowls and reclining nudes, and sculpt busts of old guys with beards. For years, that’s been the extent of our knowledge of the place. To us, the place has taken on the sort of mystery that a Masonic lodge or an Orthodox church can carry with it, and if you’ve felt the same way, we’d encourage you not to miss your chance to take a peek inside.

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The Schuler School is located at 9 E. Lafayette Ave. in Station North. (410) 685-3568. Open today from 2-6, and year round by appointment only.

Best Bets: Deck The Walls

The Chop likes looking at art. Be it in a gallery, museum, private home, or on the street, we’re always interested in the way that art can make a space speak. Perhaps our favorite setting for seeing art though is not a chic opening or an austere museum, but in the marketplace.

MICA is currently halfway through their third annual Art Market, and if you haven’t been yet, we recommend you get yourself over to Mount Royal Avenue posthaste. Events like these represent one of your best opportunities to discover quality works for exceptional values. With space for 250 vendors ranging from undergrads to established alumni, and from crafters to painters and beyond.

MICA's 3rd annual Art Market continues today and tomorrow, 10-6.

Sprawling across 3 galleries and 4 days, the 2010 Art Market is open from 10am until 6pm, ending tomorrow.

We say head down there late, and on the off chance you don’t find anything that suits your tastes, or can’t quite put your finger on that perfect piece for a friend, you can head straight up the JFX another couple exits to Atomic Books and pick up a copy of their 2011 pinup calendar which will debut tonight. Photographer Mike Lee will be on hand to give a behind-the-scenes talk on pinup style and photography, as well as take questions and presumably sign copies of the calendar.

Each calendar you buy benefits Moveable Feast, and frankly they make a much better gift for that dude you don’t know how to shop for than a record or a bottle of booze would.

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Atomic Books is located at 3620 Falls Road in Hampden.

MICA’s Art Market is at 1301 Mount Royal Avenue in Bolton Hill. Brown Center’s Leidy Atrium, Falvey Hall lobby and Rosenberg Gallery

American Visionary Art Museum Offers Free Admission Today

Well, here it is Sunday again. Caw Caw and Purple Reign and all that. We’re still not that into it. And aside from the few tiny home improvement chores still on our list, we’re going to be looking for something non-football related to entertain ourselves with today.

The Visionary offers free admission today. 11am-3pm.

Fortunately, this week it’s a pretty easy choice. We had such a good time at the BMA’s Warhol exhibit last week, that another museum trip seemed like an obvious choice for this Sunday. Even better, the AVAM is offering free admission today as part of Free Fall Baltimore.

If you ask the Chop, Free Fall Baltimore is just about the best thing that ever came out of City Hall, and if you don’t avail yourself of at least some of the program’s offerings, you’re just plain missing out on one of the best things about living in Baltimore. It’s making us smile from ear to ear.

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The American Visionary Art Museum is at 800 Key Highway in Federal Hill. Today’s Free Fall hours are from 11am until 3 pm.

Warhol: The Last Decade @ the BMA Today

Could it be true? Could it possibly, actually have happened? Have we finally found a place to go on Sundays where no one is wearing purple, drinking Miller Lite and yelling ‘Caw Caw’?

Yes, it’s true. While the rest of Baltimore is watching the Ravens and Patriots (and no doubt continuing to curse the Steelers), we’re going to head over to the Baltimore Museum of Art to see the new exhibit on that most famous of Yinzers, Andy Warhol.

10/17/10 - 1/09/11

The BMA’s website has a pretty good write up on the exhibition itself, so we’ll spare you the details, and say only that it opens to the general public today, running through January 9. While general museum admission is free, this traveling exhibit will run you $15 unless you’re a member, and at a mere $50 a year for an individual membership it’s a pretty tempting offer.

So while the rest of the city is hoping that Ray Lewis can successfully decapitate Tom Brady, we’ll be walking through Wyman Park, watching the leaves change, and probably, for personal reasons having to do with Warhol and the BMA, feeling very melancholy and nostalgic about love affairs and the Fall. We might even wear a tie.

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The BMA is at 10 Art Museum Drive in Charles Village.

Wednesday through Friday, 10:00 am to 5:00 pm

Saturday and Sunday, 11:00 am to 6:00 pm

Closed Mondays and Tuesdays

The New York Times Dumps on Baltimore Again, But Local Artists Are Too Busy Making Art to Notice

The Baltimore Chop was none too thrilled on Wednesday when we read on the Midnight Sun that the New York Times is looking down its nose at us again. They seem to see Baltimore as little more than a source for so-so regional cuisine, a great inspiration for campy Broadway musicals, and a crummy baseball team for the sweeping.

This time around they’re making us out to be a bungling, artless money-pit who is stuck in the Schmoke era and wants to copy Manhattan. We really, really wish the Times would mind their own fucking business a little more, and publish these cheap, quickie drive-by stories about Baltimore a little less.

The truth is that there’s already more creativity going on in Baltimore than the Chop can possibly keep up with. We saw an outstanding opening last night, and we’re torn between two events that deserve our full attention tonight.

Cezanne and American Modernism closes at the BMA tonight. 7-10:30 pm.

First up, Run of the Mill Theater is opening Variations on Beauty tonight in the BBOX space in MICA‘s Gateway Building. The Variations series is an ongoing project for which playwrights assemble and collaborate on various themes, with each crafting a play on the central idea. Tonight’s opening show focuses on Beauty and features eight world premieres by local writers, as well as a chance for the audience to decide on the next theme. Variations only runs 8 performances, and closes May 30 so get your tickets now.

We might have to catch a weekday performance though, because we’re probably going to keep it close to home and head over to the closing party for Cezanne and American Modernism at the BMA.

(Despite the BMA’s website, it looks like the New York Times also poo-pooed this exhibition when it opened in New Jersey.)

We’ve been meaning to get over and see this show since it opened, and for once it looks like our procrastination has paid off. The museum is keeping late hours tonight (until 10:30), and $5 for non-members is a bargain to get dressed up fancy, see the paintings, get access to the snack table and a cash bar too. Not to mention DJ’s and soundscape artists performing live.

Innovate Love auctions art at Silo Point tomorrow. 7-11 pm.

While we’re high on our visual arts horse, we’re also going to mention tomorrow’s Innovate Love art auction at Silo Point. Innovate Love is a joint benefit for Innovate Baltimore and the Baltimore Love Project; worthy causes both. We probably won’t make it out to this because tomorrow is a crazy busy night in Baltimore, but we really wish we could. We haven’t been to Silo Point yet, although we almost went to the last auction they had there. This one’s in the penthouse, so it’s likely to be pretty swank. Then again, Super Art Fight is bound to make sure it doesn’t get too stuffy in there.

We’re still looking to fill our walls up with art, but alas, Big Daddy Barack hasn’t made with our tax refund deposit yet, so an art auction is a temptation we can’t afford at the moment. Just as well. We can always spend Six Dollars! for the Sunday New York Times so they can tell us how crummy and provincial it was.

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MICA’s Gateway Building is at 1601 W. Mount Royal Ave in Bolton Hill.

The BMA is at 10 Art Museum Dr. in Charles Village.

Silo Point is at 1200 Steuart St. in Locust point.

Baltimore Portrait: New Drawings by Erin Fitzpatrick @ UB Tonight

If there’s one activity that Baltimore likes to engage in collectively, it’s looking at itself in the proverbial mirror. It’s part of the reason we love the films of John Waters so much. It’s why we think The Wire was such a wonderful show, and it’s even why we went to go see Naked Baltimore when it opened at the Metro Gallery.

This ongoing game of monkey in the mirror is also part of the reason we’re so excited about the opening of Erin Fitzpatrick‘s Baltimore Portrait series at the University of Baltimore’s Student Center tonight.

Baltimore Portrait opens at the University of Baltimore Student Center tonight. 7-9 pm (Show is on 5th floor, not 3rd).

The current installation of the Baltimore Portrait series includes 20 new local faces, selected from a total of 75 and counting, with more than half of the series completed recently. Portraits from the series have been on display since November ’09, most recently at the Theater Project’s John Fonda Gallery.

But don’t take our word for it. Erin was kind enough to answer a few quick questions for us in advance of tonight’s show. It’s the first time this blog has undertaken to do an interview, and we couldn’t be happier about it. Let’s begin, shall we?

Megan Fitzpatrick

The Baltimore Chop:

Your portrait series focuses on a collection of people from a specific place. What connections or effects have you observed between people and the places they live and vice versa?

Erin Fitzpatrick: “So far, almost all of my subjects have been Baltimore-based. Some have transplanted, but they are all people who I met here. I have plans to start some new pieces based on subjects in L.A. this summer. Maybe then I’ll be able to get a better perspective on how the portraits differ with location.

For me, working within the parameter of a certain city is about meeting, and capturing on paper or canvas, all of the interesting people that live within that area. It’s like visual networking.”

Chop:

In addition to being a working artist you’re also a proficient blogger, focusing on your portrait series as well as other more general topics like fashion and Baltimore life. What made you want to start blogging and what’s kept you going?

Fitz: “I originally started Fitzbomb as an easy way to show my art on line. I got a few hits from people I knew and through random searches. Then I started thinking about what people want to see (themselves and other people out and looking good) and how I could tie that in to my art. I started carrying a camera around and shooting nightlife (especially when I could capture people who I have drawn/painted.) This approach immediately expanded my viewing audience.”

Elena Johnston

Chop:

How has the Fitzbomb blog complemented or helped with the portraits’ creative process since it’s inception?

Fitz:
“The main way that Fitzbomb has helped my portrait project is through exposure. The next stage in my plan is to make the portrait project and the blog more cohesive.

While I’m sure that I will still photograph/post a lot of social events, I really want to get into documenting my subjects. Like, this is Erin, this is where she lives/works/hangs out, here are some interview questions that tell you what she does, and then the whole thing culminates in my final portrait. I want Fitzbomb to primarily be a place to exhibit my subjects both as portraits and as people (thus actually living up to the blog’s tag line. Ha.)”

Chop:

All of the portraits in this series are very similar in composition, with a lot of negative space at the top. Do you feel a similar look helps to highlight the differences and details in your subjects?

Fitz: “I compose my pieces with a lot of negative space to draw the viewer in to each individual portrait. So, yes, you got it.

I’ve been thinking about doing some paintings in the near future that have more than one person in them, but I would keep the same space around each figure. I think it would create interesting tensions and make the viewer look at the individuals, but wonder about the relationships.”

Jenny Andrzejewski

Chop:

Thanks so much! Is there anything else you’d like to add?

Fitz: “Nope. You asked good questions. I got to talk about the ideas that I’ve been planning in my head while drawing the pieces for my up-coming show. Also, I’m always thinking about individuals and groups who I could draw, so if you have any good ideas for me…”

If you’ve got any good ideas for Erin, you can let her know at tonight’s opening, or at www.fitzbomb.com. The current installation of Baltimore Portrait opens tonight with a reception from 7- 9 pm in the Hilda and Michael Bogomolny Room on the 5th floor, and will remain on view until August 27th in the 5th Floor Gallery.

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UB’s Student Center is at 21 W. Mount Royal Ave in Mount Vernon. See their website for gallery hours and additional information.