Outsider art in Baltimore

I ended up choosing Baltimore as my baseball trip destination last year mostly by default. For the week I could get away, it was the only place in North America I could get to on my airline points. Not knowing much about the city, once I started planning for the trip there was something that immediately caught my eye. The American Visionary Art Museum, located just around the other side of the harbour from downtown, is a one of a kind art museum in the USA. It is a museum that specializes in “outsider art.” That alone got me interested in visiting this place.

What exactly is outsider art? It’s quirky. It’s outlandish at times. It’s thematically based and curated in a way that I haven’t seen in other more traditional art museums. It’s exactly the kind of art I’m attracted to when traveling. Many times, I’ll use a city’s avant-garde public art as a way of exploring a new place… In Baltimore, they put it all under and around one roof.

Sometimes you just need an example to get a feel for what an art museum is all about. In a gallery featuring an exhibition about art relating to food, this is “Swpeepish Chef” by Christian Twamley – it’s the Muppet’s Swedish Chef made 100% out of Peeps marshmallow candies.

While I’ve now given away my favourite piece of art at the AVMA, there were a host of other pieces that caught my eye. Outside their buildings, there were some larger pieces of public art, including “Cosmic Galaxy Egg” by Andrew Logan which represents the deep space images that were first returned by the Hubble Telescope.

I whiled away a couple of enjoyable hours inside the galleries. As I entered every new room, something would inevitably catch my eye. In the displays celebrating food, this depiction of Willie Nelson done entirely in seeds entitled “BioWillie” by Jim Buhler was amazingly detailed.

In a hallway in one of the remote basement galleries, I could almost not believe what I was seeing (and hearing!) – a whole wall of art, and a sound machine, dedicated to flatulence.

This kind of art gallery might not be for everyone, but I had a blast. So many of the pieces were visually arresting – even if they didn’t interest me on a deeper level, I was fascinated with the creativity and beauty in many of the installations.

For me, as much as I enjoyed the galleries (and their air conditioning on a smoking hot August day) some of my favourite art was freely available outside the buildings. Like this giant hand protruding from one of the museum building’s walls. When I was arriving here, I wasn’t sure I was in the right spot until I saw this.

Another great outdoor installation, attached to the building is “AVAM Nest” by David Hess. I liked the symbolism in this piece of birth and renewal, a key element of this museum for me. You can enter the nest from one of the upper floors, which I can imagine would make an excellent wedding or group photo from the ground.