Rebecca Hoffberger is a visionary, pun intended. Her gorgeous, delightful, fun and at times scary museum is a jewel in the City’s art landscape. What often gets overlooked in this wonderful play house of sorts is the fact it’s run effectively and efficiently, with little to no debt ( a feat many non-profits would benefit from taking a lesson from.)
AVAM is intended to shock, delight, and spark conversation. That it does and this month’s upcoming exhibit is no exception. If thought provoking, troubling and intense art isn’t your thing might we suggest “Flick’s from the Hill”? AVAM’s signature free outdoor movie series that starts this Thursday?
FREE family films screened on Federal Hill in The Hughes Family Outdoor Theater
- When: Thursday nights: July 11 – August 22, 2013
- What Time: Screenings @ 9pm, AVAM Open & FREE 5-9pm on Flicks nights.
- Cost: FREE!
- Where: On Federal Hill
Flicks From The Hill is on TRAVEL + LEISURE’s list of “World’s Best Free Stuff,” Check it out!
2013 FLICKS SCHEDULE:
- All screenings at 9pm & FREE!
- July 11: West Side Story (1961)
- July 18: Pee-Wee’s Big Adventure (1985)
- July 25: Rear Window (1954)
- Aug 1: Raising Arizona (1987)
- Aug 8: Cry-Baby (1990) — Members’ Pick!
- Aug 15: Finding Forrester (2000)
- Aug 22: The NeverEnding Story (1984)
& Don’t Miss These Special Pre-Flicks Programs:
- July 11: 7-8:30pm Flicks Opening Night Premiere Party, $20, $15/Members
- July 18, Aug 1, Aug 15: 6:30-8pm Tours de Fed Hill Bike Rides, FREE!
- July 25: 7-7:45pm Charm City Yoga Workshop @ AVAM, FREE!
- Aug 15: 6-9pm: Shinier Happier Things Workshop with Bob Benson, $50, $35/Members
- Aug 22: 4-8pm Sketchbook Project’s Mobile “How To” Tour @ AVAM, FREE!
Also this summer, the American Visionary Art Museum presents FRANK BRUNO: A Life Devoted to THE END.—a hot hellfire and damnation exhibition featuring 14 masterworks created over the last five decades by visionary true believer Frank Bruno, with mind-blowing attention to detail. An apocalyptic painter and fierce social critic, Frank Bruno’s work and thinking have been fueled by his study of Messianic and end of the world books and preaching. Frank the product of a working Mom was born March 22, 1925 on a ranch 50 miles south of Tombstone, just outside of Douglas, Arizona to parents of Italian American heritage. Bruno’s Mother, Rose, was pregnant with Frank when her eldest son George, age 14, was killed in an automobile accident. Frank remembers she kept his brother’s bloodstained clothes in the car for years. Suffering from severe asthma as a child, Frank spent his days indoors, obsessed with drawing pictures of war: soldiers marching and in combat, and aircraft and battleships engaged in fighting. Raised during the Depression when paper was scarce, Frank’s mother would collect used paper from the butcher shops, wash the blood off, and dry them in the desert sun for young Frank to make his pictures. When Frank was 15, his mother purchased a hotel in Douglas, against her husband’s wishes. They later separated, and she ran it as a successful business.
You can learn more about the exhibit by clicking here.
About the Visionary Art Museum
The AMERICAN VISIONARY ART MUSEUM (AVAM) is America’s official national museum and education center for self-taught, intuitive artistry. Since its opening in 1995, the museum has sought to promote the recognition of intuitive, self-reliant, creative contribution as both an important historic and essential living piece of treasured human legacy. The one-of-a-kind American Visionary Art Museum is located on a 1.1 acre wonderland campus at 800 Key Highway, Baltimore Inner Harbor. Three renovated, historic, industrial buildings house wonders created by farmers, housewives, mechanics, retired folk, the disabled, the homeless, as well as the occasional neurosurgeon – all inspired by the fire within. From carved roots to embroidered rags, tattoos to toothpicks, the visionary transforms dreams, loss, hopes, and ideals into powerful works of art.
AVAM is open Tuesday thru Sunday, 10am–6pm. The museum is closed on Mondays,* Christmas Day and Thanksgiving Day. AVAM is located next to historic Federal Hill park at 800 Key Highway, Baltimore Inner Harbor, 21230. Admission prices, general museum info, directions, parking info & more can all be found online at http://avam.org or by calling 410-244-1900.
*OPEN Monday, Martin Luther King, Jr. Day as AVAM’s celebration of all of life’s possibilities! Free admission & special programming.