Artwalk
Baltimore is a city of contrasts. The downtown Inner Harbor, with its glass shopping pavilions, futuristic-looking National Aquarium, and state-of-the-art baseball and football stadiums, reflects a city on the move. Yet Baltimoreans take just as much pride in historic neighborhoods, such as Federal Hill, Fells Point, and Mount Vernon, and the city's rugged, seafaring past.
Another element in the mix is Baltimore's eclectic arts community. The city hosts three world-class museums, art and craft galleries and growing enclaves of artists' studios reclaimed from old factory buildings throughout the city, all of which make for myriad possibilities for visitors in search of visual pleasures. The Walters Art Gallery, the Baltimore Museum of Art, and the American Visionary Art Museum anchor Baltimore's visual arts scene. Each is a magnet for clusters of galleries in four distinct area of town.
First Stop: The Inner Harbor
The American Visionary Art Museum (AVAM), just around the bend in Key Highway across from Harborplace's gleaming pavilions, is the realization of a dream by local philanthropist and art enthusiast Rebecca Hoffberger. She is the guiding spirit behind the building and the sculpture barn that house works many call "outside art," but Hoffberger prefers to call "visionary."
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© Fran Severn
