UMBC Visual Arts Department
Permanent URI for this collectionhttp://hdl.handle.net/11603/47
Mission
The Department of Visual Arts carries out UMBC’s mission as a dynamic public research university. Our diverse, internationally acclaimed faculty are committed to guiding future artists and design professionals to think independently, work imaginatively, and implement creative solutions to real world problems. By providing an environment of collaborative research and interdisciplinary learning, we enable experimentation across media. Our BA, BFA and MFA curricula equip students to push beyond disciplinary parameters as they move skillfully between technologies, processes, and modes of thinking.
Vision
The department seeks to become an international model for art and design programs within a public research university that stresses cross-disciplinary activities. We envision students as agile, flexible thinkers and civically engaged leaders in a rapidly changing world.
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Recent Submissions
Item Piano:(2024/01/01) Putchinski, Kristin Sarah; Durant, Mark A; Visual Arts; Imaging and Digital ArtsPiano: is a series of actions, performances and sculptures that utilize pianos as the primary objects through which I explore concepts of tension, transformation and release. It is a trifold process of unmaking, playing and remaking. Pianos are rich in symbolic meaning. This work is inspired by my desire to challenge my traditional training in this instrument and to express some of my experience of recovery from profound encounters with violent trauma. In these pages, I illustrate the origins of my ideas and my creative process. In three chapters, I describe materials, movements and memories using mutable language that reflects the unpredictable nature of my healing.Item Henry Ossawa Tanner and His Influence in America(Traditional Fine Arts Organization, 2006-06-07) Smalls, JamesBaltimore Museum of Art, June 7-November 26, 2006Item Henry Ossawa Tanner and the Lure of Paris(Traditional Fine Arts Organization, 2005-12-02) Smalls, JamesBaltimore Museum of Art, December 7, 2005-May 28, 2006Item A GHOST OF A CHANCE: Invisibility and Elision in African American Art Historical Practice(The University of Chicago Press, 1994-04) Smalls, JamesItem Man, Idea, Image: Photographs of Men from the Mark Rice Collection(UMBC Albin O. Kuhn Library Gallery, 2017-08-30) Smalls, JamesAlbin O. Kuhn Library Gallery, University of Maryland, Baltimore County, August 30-December 12, 2017Item Voicing New Critical Perspectives(The University of Chicago Press, 2003-04) Smalls, JamesItem Slavery is a Woman: ‘Race,’ Gender, and Visuality in Marie Benoist’s Portrait d’une négresse (1800)(Association of Historians of Nineteenth-Century Art, 2004) Smalls, JamesItem A teacher uses Star Trek for difficult conversations on race and gender(The Conversation, 2015-07-22) Smalls, JamesWhat can Star Trek teach us about today’s trek of life?Item The Concentric Self(2024-01-01) Zellhofer, Anna May; Durant, Mark A; Visual Arts; Imaging and Digital ArtsThis introspection of visual art and poetry delves into the profound layers of human existence, likening it to the concentric rings of a tree. Each ring represents an experience, both tangible and intangible, visible and invisible, that shapes the core of the being. The concept of "dendrochronology of self" captures this idea, visually suggesting a method of understanding the being through the examination of life's rings. It speaks to the interconnectedness of the past, present, and future “self”. The word void means to be invalid, empty, and null. When in reference to the body the void, to me, is when the being is not perceived as a subject. This is when your body becomes a number or statistic. I think this equally means that contributions by a person, whatever the contributions may be, are not dignified. The void also represents space, infinity, and nonexistence. The body is made of a culmination of deep-rooted experiences, both bitter and sweet. I visualize life experience as concentric and contour lines in my visual art. I represent the void as black space that engulfs the figure in the exact moment when the corporeal “self” tumbles into symbolic eternity. The focus on the instance of the fall, is a mnemonic visualization of ordinary reality meeting the origin and conclusion of being and existing. Even when existing within the void, emptiness does not wholly consume us.Item In Praise of the Unknown.(2024-01-01) Kalantari, Elly; Durant, Mark MK; Visual Arts; Imaging and Digital ArtsMy artistic vision for In Praise of the Unknown embodies a profound inner quest intertwined with my physical journeys across diverse cultures and landscapes. The installation mirrors the complexity of my personal journey, oscillating between the individual self and the collective synthesis of cultural influences. Embracing the diasporic condition, In Praise of the Unknown is an empowering journey, a celebration of the inherent power of the self within the "other." I embody this sense of otherness rooted in my experience within a patriarchal system, extending it through my perspectives during my nomadic travels to present an unfamiliar state of metamorphosis. As a woman born in Iran, I've experienced secondary status to men. My focus on diaspora and liberation, therefore, unfolds through the deconstruction, displacement, and transformation of my female body, redefining otherness as a source of empowerment and challenging conventional victim narratives.Item Home New World(2024-01-01) Liang, Te En; Bell, Kathryn; Visual Arts; Imaging and Digital ArtsHome New World is a self-portrait that delves into the liminal space of my 13-year-old self recently arrived in a new country. My inspiration for this project stems from challenges in my current life, including fatherhood and ailing parents. These experiences led me to reexamine that transitional period of assimilation, recollecting memories of when everything around me appeared new and unfamiliar, almost as if I were being newly born. I believe that creating art through lived experiences, and drawing inspiration from the events that unfold in everyday life reveals a path toward self-transformation.My work consists of fragmented memories presented through a series of drawings and related floating objects in the form of mobiles, set within an environment of looping video projection and sound. Each drawing and its corresponding object carry significant personal anecdotes. In the gallery the objects move kinetically, mirroring the properties of memories: fading in and out, stacking on top of one another, and blending the forgotten with the remembered. Their shadows fall onto a looping carousel of painted suburban homes. This written thesis is structured to emulate the mobile organization of Home New World. Whereas writing unfolds sequentially, the experience of visual art is “all at once.” That is, often there is no prescribed entry point to the work. To remain authentic to my artwork, I have persisted in attempting to structure the written thesis to intuitively mimic the layered, fragmented, and disorienting aspects of my artwork. This memoir is composed of whimsical anecdotes strung together and interspersed with theoretical insights and artistic influences on my creative process. Each anecdote represents a memory associated with a significant object, revealing glimpses of the past. These stories weave together, fading in and out of focus, creating a non-chronological sequence that reflects my past life in contemplation of the present.?Item Mellon Foundation grants CAHSS $750K to establish Global Asias Initiative(UMBC News, 2024-04-03) Duque, Catalina Sofia Dansberger; Demond, MarlaynaItem UMBC celebrates 25th Undergraduate Research and Creative Achievement Day with an expanded global audience(UMBC News, 2021-05-12) Duque, Catalina Sofia DansbergerItem EMERGING STRATEGIES “UNDER THE BAY” IN AR/XR(ISEA, 2023) Moren, Lisa; Bachvaroff, Tsvetan“Under the Bay” is an augmented reality project where anyone can use their cell phone like a microscope and reveal invisibilities in our world and marine life. When they do a series of animated stories between humans and non-humans emerge. Images, sounds, and stories are affected by live data streamed in from sensors located in the largest estuary in North America. Sensors in the Chesapeake Bay relay live pH, oxygen, temperature, etc. (figure 9). Similar to the water itself, color, speed, audio fluctuate with the water and marine life, making “Under the Bay” a datadriven narrative with eight scenes that tell a story of a world beneath the marine surface, and the exciting but frail health of estuaries and oceans worldwide. The two projects discussed here, “Under the Bay” (2022) and “What is the Shape of Water?” (2020), are part of Lisa Moren’s series of cross-species artworks aimed at diminishing human-centered exceptionalism. The collaborations began in 2019 when Lisa was the inaugural Artist-in-Resident at the Institute for Marine and Environmental Technology (IMET). There, she met researcher and marine biologist, Dr. Tsvetan Bachvaroff (Tsetso) and the two immediately shared a like-minded vision to develop a project that exemplified phenomenal exceptionalisms in microorganisms. In this paper we argue that novel strategies in nature emerge when a complexity of matter is intermingled with conditions of differentiation. We explain and identify differentiation in art and architecture, symbiosis in biology, and the “wobble” in physics as core principles for new forms and creative strategies to emerge. The outcome is focused on the unusual and significant diversification of dinoflagellate microbe’s in the Chesapeake Bay and oceans worldwide. Tsetso directed the live organisms, science and data analysis for the augmented reality project. Stories are written and told by Lisa, who produced and art directed the animation and AR scenes. The sound score is by electronic composer Dan Deacon. Dr. Marc Olano led the software engineering and development with John Boutsikas, for the AR app in IOS and Google Play.Item The Space is a Body and You Are In It: a collaboration(2023-01-01) Kroll, Anna; Rosskam, Julienne; Visual Arts; Imaging and Digital ArtsThe Space is a Body and You Are In It is a collaboration between Chlo� Engel and Anna Kroll exploring collaborative imagining. Consisting of The Game and Game Space, booklets of reflections and a silent video projection, these many elements combine to examine the possibilities and impossibilities of shared realities and the multitudes of ?We.?Item THE CHAPEL OF IMAGINATION(2023-01-01) Aleinikova, Elizaveta; Bell, Kathryn; Visual Arts; Imaging and Digital ArtsThe Chapel of Imagination is a multimedia installation and an artist?s self-portrait subverting and reimagining the layout of the traditional Eastern Orthodox Church and Russian folktales through a mix of animation, projection mapping, and sculptural objects.Item Dear Dhaka...(2023-01-01) Hossain, Fahmida; Cazabon, Lynn; Visual Arts; Imaging and Digital ArtsDear Dhaka? is a multimedia installation consisting of two works, 'Under Construction' and 'Aborodhbashini,' emanating from the artist's experience living in Dhaka as an urban citizen and a woman using concrete, cotton Sharee, fabric, and audio-visual video projection.Item Crazy in Louvre: How Beyoncé and Jay-Z Exploit Western Art History to Ask Who Controls Black Bodies(Frieze, 2018-06-29) Smalls, JamesAn art historian explains what the Carters’s takeover of the Paris museum says about art, race and powerItem James Smalls on Here is a Strange and Bitter Crop(Space Studios, 2018-09) Smalls, JamesItem “Expressive Camouflage”: Classicism, Race, and Homoerotic Desire in the Male Nudes of Richmond Barthé(PANORAMA, 2018) Smalls, James