Current Exhibitions
The Baltimore Museum of Art’s outstanding collection encompasses 90,000 works of art, including the largest holding of works by Henri Matisse in the world, as well as masterpieces by Pablo Picasso, Paul Cézanne, and Vincent van Gogh.
A summertime oasis, the BMA’s Sculpture Gardens feature a 100-year survey of modern and contemporary sculpture on nearly three landscaped acres in the heart of the city. Admission to the collection is free to everyone, every day.
If you are traveling to see a particular work of art, please call ahead to 443-573-1730 to make sure it is on view.
Black Box: Lorna Simpson
June 27–August 31, 2014
Free exhibition
The power of Lorna Simpson’s video installation lies in its choir of 15 voices gently humming the melody “Easy to Remember,” a haunting song about love and loss. Within the tranquil, flowing meditation, individual interpretations of the song emerge as we hear unique intonations. One of the highlights of the BMA’s contemporary collection, Easy to Remember appeals to viewers “to recognize the common humanity that unites us all,” said Curator of Contemporary Art Kristen Hileman.
Simpson is one of the leading artists of her generation whose work has been widely collected and exhibited by such institutions as the Museum of Modern Art in New York, Walker Art Center in Minneapolis, and Irish Museum of Modern Art in Dublin. In 2006, a mid-career survey of her work was presented at the Los Angeles Museum of Contemporary Art, Miami Museum of Art, Whitney Museum of American Art, the Kalamazoo Institute of Art, and the Gibbes Museum in South Carolina.
Front Room: Seth Adelsberger
June 27–November 2, 2014
Free exhibition
A variety of luminescent and textured paintings from Baltimore-based artist Seth Adelsberger demonstrates the artist’s innovative approaches to painting over the past five years.
In intense blues and saturated magentas, he creates his Submersion Paintings by staining untreated canvases with rich washes of acrylic paint before applying a thick layer of gesso. In his hands, this viscous white paint is unorthodoxly sandwiched in between the initial stained layers and a final wash of color, adding texture and dynamic form.
In his Border Paintings, the artist treats a painting’s surface as material to be cut away, leaving only a painted and wrapped edge to frame the void where one would expect to find the most important part of a picture. In other pieces, carpet fragments enhanced with images digitally manipulated replace paint and canvas as the media from which a ‘painting’ is made.
Adelsberger (American, born 1979) is the co-Founding Director of Nudashank Gallery, which has exhibited work by emerging artists, many from Baltimore’s vibrant arts community. His own work has been featured in group and solo exhibitions across the country. In 2008, he received the top award for painting from the Maryland State Arts Council. He received his BSA in Fine Arts from Towson University in 2002, and is a native of Emmitsburg, Maryland.
Read the exhibition brochure (pdf)
The exhibition is organized by Curator of Contemporary Art Kristen Hileman.
On Paper: Figure Drawings from the Thomas E. Benesch Memorial Collection
April 20–September 14, 2014
Free exhibition
There are as many approaches to the human figure as there are artists. See ten compelling variations of the figure from contemporary masters in the latest On Paper exhibition. The intimate presentation features drawings from artists such as David Hockney, Willem de Kooning, Robert Rauschenberg, and others.
The exhibition is drawn from the Museum’s Thomas E. Benesch Memorial Collection, a group of more than 140 outstanding drawings by international contemporary artists. These works are shown in the Contemporary Wing gallery dedicated to the presentation of the BMA’s renowned holdings of prints, drawings, and photographs.
Curated by Ann Shafer, Associate Curator for Prints, Drawings & Photographs.
German Expressionism: A Revolutionary Spirit
Through September 14, 2014
Free exhibition
More than 35 vivid paintings, drawings, prints, watercolors, and sculpture present an overview of the revolutionary art movement that flourished in Germany during the first three decades of the 20th century. The exhibition features powerful examples by Max Beckmann, Ernst Ludwig Kirchner, Wassily Kandinsky, Franz Marc, and other artists associated with the two most prominent Expressionist artist groups: Die Brücke (The Bridge) and Der Blaue Reiter (The Blue Rider), as well as several independent expressionists.The exhibition includes several of the BMA’s outstanding, rarely shown color woodcuts, as well as loans from private collections.
Curated by Associate Curator of European Painting & Sculpture Oliver Shell.
Contemporary Art Wing Now Open!
There’s always something new to see at the BMA. The Museum’s exciting new presentation of the art of our time keeps the visitor experience lively and fresh through two new exhibition series and the return of the acclaimed Front Room series.
Guyton\Walker. Untitled. 2011. The Baltimore Museum of Art: Fanny B. Thalheimer Memorial Fund, BMA 2011.39.1-27. Courtesy of Greene Naftali Gallery, New York
Sarah Oppenheimer
Architectural intervention
November 18, 2012 – Ongoing
The BMA is the first major museum to commission and acquire a site-specific installation by award-winning artist Sarah Oppenheimer. For the dramatic two-part work, the artist opens sightlines between the 2nd and 3rd floors of the Contemporary Wing and through the wall between the contemporary and Cone collections, inserting meticulously crafted aluminum and reflective glass. The groundbreaking architectural intervention allows you to see unexpected views of fellow visitors, art works, and galleries above, below, and across from you.
Oppenheimer received a BA in Semiotics from Brown University and an MFA from Yale University, where she is a visiting critic in painting and printmaking in the School of Art. Her work has been exhibited in the U.S. and Europe at venues including the Rice University Art Gallery, Houston; the Saint Louis Art Museum; the Museum of Contemporary Art, San Diego; and the Skulpturens Hus, Stockholm.
Oppenheimer’s architectural intervention at the BMA is generously funded by the Nathan L. and Suzanne F. Cohen Contemporary Art Acquisitions Endowment and a gift from the Friends of Modern and Contemporary Art.
Visit your favorite works by Matisse, Picasso, Pissarro, Courbet, and Degas in the world-class Cone Collection galleries. Special exhibitions inspired by or from the collection are often presented in these galleries as well.
Please Note: A traveling exhibition of works from the BMA's Matisse collection is on a year-long tour to Indianapolis, Minneapolis, and San Antonio from August 2013 through October 2014. During this time, visitors can see German Expressionism: A Revolutionary Spirit (through September 14, 2014).
A Grand Legacy: Five Centuries of European Art
European Art Galleries
Ongoing
A Grand Legacy: Five Centuries of European Art features the monumental Rinaldo and Armida, one of the world's finest paintings by Sir Anthony van Dyck, as well as masterpieces by Frans Hals, Rembrandt van Rijn, and Jean Baptiste Siméon Chardin.
