BALTIMORE, MD – The Baltimore Museum of Art announced today that Baltimore-based artist Phaan Howng and Blue Water Baltimore have been selected as the next artist/non-profit team to take over the Commons in the BMA’s Patricia and Mark Joseph Education Center. Beginning November 2017, the team will unveil a colorful art installation that encompasses the entire gallery and present a series of public programs that explore the effects of environmental issues on community and home. This is the third year of the Commons Collaboration project, which seeks to engage audiences through innovative art and programs inspired by the adjacent Imagining Home exhibition.
“We were fortunate this year to have a very competitive group of applicants, with a lot of passion, commitment, and great ideas. Making a choice was extremely difficult,” said BMA Dorothy Wagner Wallis Director Christopher Bedford. “We are excited about working with Phaan and seeing how her installation will spark conversations about the fragility and resilience of our physical environment, especially in connection to how we think about our shared home.”
Through the use of intense and unnatural colors, Howng will create environments that disguise themselves in order to immerse and disorient viewers. By doing so, the artist aims to generate dialogue about current ecological crises brought on by the Anthropocene (human-influenced) age. The installation and accompanying programs with Blue Water Baltimore will bring awareness to the protection and restoration of Baltimore’s waterways and their important role in public health and civic life.
Howng was selected from an impressive short-list of artists and nonprofit teams including Amber Eve Anderson with Baltimore Node, Colette Veasey-Cullors with Waxter Senior Center, and Melani Douglass with New Lens. The artist/non-profit team was selected by BMA staff with an advisory panel including Lee Heinemann, education director of The Contemporary, and Stephen Towns, artist and program coordinator of the Maryland Institute College of Art’s Office of Community Engagement.
PHAAN HOWNG
Phaan Howng (American, b. 1982) is a painter, sculptor, installation, and performance artist based in Baltimore. She received an MFA in multidisciplinary art from the Maryland Institute College of Art, where she is faculty language learning instructor. The multidisciplinary artist has been awarded residences at Windy Mowing, Halifax, VT (2015); Tyler School of Art, Philadelphia (2012); and Vermont Studio Center, Johnson, VT (2005). Howng has also received honors for her recent work and has given artist talks regionally. Her latest solo and group exhibitions include Biological Controls: If It Bleeds We Can Kill It at School 33 Art Center, Baltimore; Strange Genitals, Art F City, Brooklyn; Satellite Art Show, Miami Beach; and Instigate. Activate: No Place, No You or Me, Arlington Arts Centre.
General admission to the BMA is free. Special exhibitions may be ticketed. The BMA is open Wednesday through Sunday from 10 a.m.–5 p.m. The museum is closed Monday, Tuesday, New Year’s Day, July 4, Thanksgiving, and Christmas. The BMA is located at 10 Art Museum Drive, three miles north of Baltimore’s Inner Harbor. For general museum information, call 443-573-1700 or visit artbma.org
