Insider: Days and nights at the museum
If you live in Baltimore, you know the Walters Art Museum. But just how well do you know it?Thanks to Gary Vikan’s recently published memoir, Sacred and Stolen: Confessions of a Museum Director, the next time you visit the Walters, you’ll have a greater appreciation of just what goes on behind the scenes of an internationally renowned museum — one Baltimoreans are... READ MORE
Come get your fresh fruit and vegetables!
The Last of the Mohicans is how Donald Savoy III described the remaining handful of arabbers left in Baltimore on a sunny Wednesday, while watching a fellow horse-drawn cart vendor load up with fresh fruit and vegetables.Almost every day, fresh produce sellers known as arabbers, all African-American, take to the streets of Baltimore with a horse and a cart to sell to residents around the... READ MORE
First-time author at 90 dreams of Oscars
Seven years ago, Frances Chavarria of Rockville, Md., wrote her first novel, inspired by the 35 years she lived in Costa Rica. But discouraged after an editor criticized it, she put the manuscript away until a friend convinced her to dust if off and self-publish the book.This spring, Chavarria became a published author — at the age of 90.Chavarria’s novel, Let Us Dream of... READ MORE
Beauty and the Beast enchants at Toby’s
The tale may be “old as time,” but Beauty and the Beast has seen plenty of new life lately. With the new Disney live-action film setting box office records in movie theaters, fans can get a similar, but more fleshed-out, experience of the musical from the stage version currently at Toby’s Dinner Theatre in Columbia.It features all the beloved original songs from the... READ MORE
Little-known Fire Museum is a real gem
Thanks to the late Stephen G. Heaver’s fascination with firefighting apparatus (the term fire fighters use for their customized vehicles), Baltimore has the distinction of housing the third largest fire museum in the United States. Located in Lutherville, the Fire Museum of Maryland, founded in 1971, is a leader in preserving, restoring and interpreting the history of the urban fire... READ MORE
Dance with grace comes from experience
Their legs may not extend as high or their pliés be as deep, but older dancers bring a depth to their performance that younger dancers cannot. That’s the view of Torens Johnson, producer of this year’s “Ageless Grace” dance concert, to be held Sunday, May 7 at the Creative Alliance at The Patterson.Dance Baltimore, a nonprofit arts organization directed by Cheryl ... READ MORE
Putting on a show for charity
Judy Kahl, Jody Duke, and Deb Wilson rehearse for the Paint and Powder Club’s upcoming performance on June 2 and 3. The club, which was founded in 1893 and puts on shows to benefit charity, is thought to be the oldest of its kind in the United States.Photo by Jason SaulerBaltimore has many nicknames, including the “city of firsts,” with such claims to fame as the first... READ MORE
Funny? Serious? ‘Well’ is hard to describe
Well, now. How to describe Well — the quirky, perspective-shifting, serio-comic play from New York actor and writer Lisa Kron? That, as they say in the theater, is the question. What you see at 1st Stage, a non-profit theater in Tysons, Va., may depend on what you bring into the theater with you.It’s a mother-daughter play for some. Others may see it as an examination... READ MORE
Venus Theatre focuses on women writers
Deborah Randall says her audiences have an “immersion experience” at the Venus Theatre in Laurel, and this could include, as it recently did, sharing a dinner being cooked up on stage.In Soft Revolution, a play about Afghans in Australia, Venus founder-director Randall felt the recent production needed a sign of authenticity, so a pot of Kabuli palaw, the Afghan national dish,... READ MORE
Novels help heal war’s trauma
For Ellicott City resident Tom Glenn, 80, “Not to write would be to accept damnation. If I gave up writing, my spiritual life would come to an end. I would be a husk, and cease to be a human being.”For Glenn, you see, writing is not only a compulsion — “I’ve been writing since I was 6 years old” — but also a therapy. It eases the post-traumatic... READ MORE
Arts 2024
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