Artscape B23 exhibit to showcase Baltimore history and culture
BALTIMORE -- One of the nation's largest free arts festivals returns in 2023. Artscape promises to transform Baltimore into a vibrant creative corridor by way of locally based artists at an exhibit called B-23.
Twenty-seven floors on top of Baltimore's World Trade Center offer the best views of the city. More importantly, it features the work of an artist who will be on display at this year's Artscape exhibition entitled B-23.
"This exhibition B23 is very important because it gives artists, visual artists, fine artists a platform to shine," said Kirk Shannon-Butts, Senior Curator & Public Art Manager for the Baltimore Office of Promotion and Arts.
It's a chance for 24 Baltimore-based artists to display the passion behind their work, especially for artists like Kim Rice.
It's an opportunity to highlight culture, compassion, and crisis through their creative minds.
For Kim, her exhibit, "Re-Birth of a Nation," shows how Baltimore is the birthplace of redlining and how that has affected communities across our city.
"This is the redlining map of Baltimore, this is the Inner Harbor right here - and a lot of time with redlining maps. What's interesting is they either stay exactly the same or the city stays segregated by race and economics the same, or they flip due to gentrification. So this area that was once considered hazardous is now a big money area," Rice said.
In Kim's work, she's also educating the public through her fine art. This display is made through colored zip-ties that she says represents segregation, safety, violence, and a safety net that a lot of Black residents are still not afforded.