If you’re looking for somewhere to go in Baltimore to satisfy your desire for the unconventional, look no further than the American Visionary Art Museum (AVAM). The AVAM, located at 800 Key Highway in Federal Hill, is the place to go to see art that you might not see anywhere else.
The museum was established in 1995 as a place to display and preserve outsider art and has been designated by Congress as the national museum for self taught art. Even a cursory glance will tell you that this is no ordinary museum, as visitors are greeted with a stunning mirror mosaic on the exterior walls. The AVAM’s other permanent installations include the Giant Whirligig, a massive, wind powered, outdoor sculpture; the World’s First Family of Robots, a collection of robots made from salvaged parts of old electronics; and Baltimore Painted Screens and Row home Theater, a historical tradition and folk art born right here in Baltimore.
“An original and unabashedly idealistic art exhibition that champions the radiant and transformative power of hope. Over twenty five visionary artists, among them many “super survivors” of enormous personal traumas, exhibit soulful creations reflecting their personal transcendence, and, often, a heightened or newfound creativity and sense of humor.”
The Big Hope Show runs until September 4, 2016. In addition to their regular exhibits, the AVAM is regularly involved in community efforts, often sponsoring local artistic events, such art car events and the annual East Coast Championship Kinetic Sculpture Race.
The AVAM’s dedication to unconventional art makes it a quintessential Baltimore landmark. Anyone with an artistic side would do themselves a disservice to not visit this one of a kind museum.
This post is part 2 of our “Bmore Inspired in Baltimore” series. See part 1 here.
Mitch is a volunteer copywriter for AIGA Baltimore. In the real world, he’s usually indulging in gaming of some kind, controller or dice in hand. Find him on Twitter at @mc_mittens.
Designers and creatives of all kinds visiting Baltimore will find that the city has a long tradition of supporting
the arts and so regularly hold events in that vein. The warmer months in particular allow visitors to take in
these events and festivals while wandering our beautiful city. Three such events are the Maryland Film
Festival, Artscape, and the Kinetic Sculpture Race. (But, we’d be remiss if we didn’t also mention the
newcomer festival in Baltimore, Light City.)
Artscape
Artscape is an annual festival that takes place in the areas surrounding Baltimore’s centrally located Penn
Station. It is the country’s largest free arts festival, hosting hundreds of artists of just about every variety.
Visual arts exhibitions can be found throughout the festival, at specific locations or even in the streets,
featuring fine art, fashion, crafts, sculpture, art cars, photography, and more.
Artscape also features plenty of
performance art, including theater, opera, dance, film, live music concerts, and even performances from the
Baltimore Symphony Orchestra. The festival is one of the highlights of the summer for Baltimore residents
and visitors alike. Artscape 2016 will be held from July 15–17, and you check their website for details on
specific events.
MD Film Festival
Going into it’s 19th year, the Maryland Film Festival has continually fostered local
and international film and video work of all lengths and genres. There are screenings over five days every
year in the first week of May at the Baltimore Museum of Art, the Maryland Institute College of Art (MICA),
and the soontoberestored Parkway Theater. Baltimore’s most legendary filmmaker John Waters picks a
favorite film every year to introduce, too, and he’s as hilarious, uncouth, and as witty as you’d imagine.
Kinetic Sculpture Race
Although already past for this year, the Kinetic Sculpture Race is one of Baltimore’s most distinctive events.
Hosted by the American Visionary Art Museum, the race challenges entrants to custom build amphibious
humanpowered vehicles to race through the city. The races takes eight hours and covers 14 miles, leading
racers through several Baltimore neighborhoods, parks, and even into the Inner Harbor itself.
The first ever Kinetic Sculpture Race took place in 1969 in Ferndale, California, though the races now take place is several places across the country. The first Baltimore race took place in 1999, when AVAM founder Rebecca Hoffberger heard about the California race on television. Since then, the AVAM has not only sponsored the event, but also participated, racing Fifi the giant pink poodle every year since 2001. Fifi has become the race’s mascot and is on permanent display at the museum. Vehicles are built to resemble
anything from a giant crocodile to a Rube Goldberg mousetrap. Words don’t really do justice to the creativity
that racers have in building their vehicles. You can find pictures of vehicles from each year’s race on their
website.
Though these are three of the most distinguished largescale Baltimore events, they are only a very small
sample of what our city has to offer visiting designers. AIGA Baltimore’s own Annual Design Week, held the
3rd week of October each year, is sure to entice visiting and local designers alike. And you can always
check out the city’s events calendar to find something to suit your tastes. Baltimore is a city that has something
for everyone!
This post is part 1 of our “Bmore Inspired in Baltimore” series.
Mitch is a volunteer copywriter for AIGA Baltimore. In the real world, he’s usually indulging in gaming of some kind, controller or dice in hand. Find him on Twitter at @mc_mittens.
A recent transplant from Texas by way of NYC, Andrea Chen is happy to call Baltimore her home. She’s a graphic designer at T. Rowe Price, owns her own company the codex club, and loves to knit, cook, and garden. Tweet her @andreachen3d.
AIGA Baltimore is calling all designers looking to make in impact in our community! The nation and the world have been focused on Baltimore as we have confronted some of the major issues of our time. Last June we hosted an event focused on examining the issues facing Baltimore — designers came together, discussed the complex problems that affect our city, and used design thinking to concept solutions.
AIGA Baltimore has been working since then to determine the best course of action. After months of discussions, planning, and meetings internally and with city and community leaders; we have concluded that as an organization, our efforts can be most effective by assisting those who are already doing great work within the community. Therefore, in the coming months, we will be working in partnership with the Druid Heights Community Development Corporation and Neighborhood Design Center to develop the community branding for Druid Heights CDC. These branding efforts will include designing a new logo and branding system, templates for print collateral and social media, and a website review and redesign.
AIGA Baltimore will be working with Neighborhood Design Center to help with project management, and will be engaging members and leaders within the Druid Heights community during the process as well.
But we need YOU to do it!
AIGA Baltimore is looking for designers, creative and art directors, interactive and UX designers for this initiative. Apply by March 25th to get involved.
Druid Heights is one of Baltimore’s oldest neighborhoods with a rich historical background. The Druid Heights Community Development Corporation’s mission is to cause, encourage and promote community self-empowerment through the development of economic, educational, employment and affordable housing opportunities. They are one of the most active community centers in the city with a wide range of community resources and programs including peace patrols, environmental stewardship, senior programs, summer camps, youth initiatives, re-entry programs, community school initiatives, housing counseling, and real estate development.
The DHCDC has also been recognized for community revitalization and housing accomplishments such as the Commitment to Excellence Award by the Maryland Department of Housing and Community Development, the Community Advocate Award by the City of Baltimore and the Economic Empowerment Challenge Award by the NAACP, to name a few. The center was visited by members of the World Bank this past fall in recognition of their work within the community.
About the Neighborhood Design Center
Since 1968, the Neighborhood Design Center has provided pro-bono planning and design services to over 2,400 community initiatives that have helped communities build new playgrounds, reclaim vacant lots and abandoned buildings, revitalize commercial districts, create community master plans, and beautify their neighborhoods.
Expectations Volunteers can expect to work 1-3 hours per week for the duration of the project and attend scheduled reviews.
Timeline Dates are tentative and subject to change
Monday, March 14 — Applications open
Friday, March 25 — Applications due
Friday, April 1 — AIGA to contact volunteers
Tuesday, April 5 — Volunteer Introduction meeting with NDC (1 hour)
Tuesday, April 12 — Project Kickoff with Druid Heights (1.5-2 hours)
Tuesday, April 26 — Design check-in
Tuesday, May 3 — Design check-in
Tuesday, May 10 — Internal design review with NDC (1.5 hours)
Tuesday, May 31 — Stakeholder design review (1.5-2 hours). Meet with the same group as at the project kickoff, review designs. Determine next steps.
The national AIGA headquarters recently launched an expanded AIGA identity, a direction that will allow each chapter to express their own personality while being able to unify under one distinct voice. Developed by Kiss Me I’m Polish, the new visual system strengthens the current AIGA brand while unifying chapter branding across the country.
In introducing brighter, bolder use of color, a new typographic sensibility, and encouraging the logo to play a more active and dynamic role in all of its applications, the AIGA brand remains consistently strong and recognizable as it moves forward, while reflecting all of the vibrancy and diversity of our chapters, members, programs and initiatives.
To give each chapter a unique identity, a pool of ten colors options and two typefaces were presented to all 70 AIGA chapters throughout the country. Each was tasked with choosing just one color and typeface to best represent their chapter.
FUN FACT: The last brand refresh was in 2008, and chapters had a whopping 24 colors to choose from.
Presented with a design problem, we did what any other group of designers would do: use design thinking to solve it. First, we polled members to uncover initial reactions to the typeface and color choices. Then, we formed a smaller branding committee and worked to identify Charm City’s strongest characteristics: robust, passionate, quirky, gritty.
With a foundation laid, we discussed typography. We had two typefaces to work with: GT Haptik and Serifa. The board had unanimously chosen GT Haptik Bold for it’s bold, bright personality and its quirky letterforms in our initial poll, and the members of the branding committee felt it was the right choice. GT Haptik provides just the right amount of visual balance when both the AIGA logo and chapter logotype would be used in tandem.
Finally, we looked at the given set of colors to represent our chapter: teal, aqua, pink, purple, lime, orange, red, blue, green, and cyan. One by one, we went through each option and discussed how each color connected to Baltimore’s characteristics. The blues and greens resonated with our connection to the harbor, and red has been used historically by our chapter. Orange and purple were in the running, of course, because they, too, reflect a certain quirkiness (but ultimately we felt Baltimore’s design style and spirit couldn’t be fully reflected by a color that was so heavily identified as a sports team color).
After rounds of debate, we eventually narrowed our options down to one final solution: Pink.
The new AIGA Baltimore logo
Pink, the color of the flamingo hanging above Cafe Hon in Hampden. Pink, one of two colors found on the ubiquitous pens that proliferate our town whilst promoting a certain bail bonds company. Pink, a color that speaks to not only the quirky nature of our city, but also to the boldness of its residents.
We chose pink because it stands out. It isn’t apologetic for being different and it owns up to its convictions. And yet, as much as it’s bold, it’s also welcoming, bringing forth a positive brightness to our home.
We chose this brand direction because these characteristics embody both Baltimore and its creatives. We hope you feel the same warmth, passion and energy through all your interactions with AIGA Baltimore.
AIGA Baltimore’s Brand (New) Identity Guide
Rob Schilke is the Outreach Chair at AIGA Baltimore and graphic designer at T. Rowe Price. When he isn’t dreaming about his next snowboarding session, he can be found in his hammock plotting his next adventure. Tweet him @robschilke.
Image Credit: The featured image above, “410 Banner”, is a derivative of “Baltimore City” by Yianni Mathioudakis, used under CC BY-NC 2.0. “410 Banner” is licensed under CC BY by AIGA Baltimore.
Using scientific proof and state-of-the-art multimedia techniques, Aaron James Draplin of the Draplin Design Codelivers a sucker punch of a talk that aims to provide bonafide proof of work, the highs and lows of a ferociously independent existence and a couple tall tales from his so-called career in the cutthroat world of contemporary graphic design.
Just a regular guy with a trajectory a little dirtier than yours, his talk is open to all oncomers brave enough to show up. If you are a youngster, you may find yourself inspired to attack your design future in a different way. If you are established, you may just leave feeling grateful you don’t have anything to do with him. Hard to say. Be there!
Address: University of Maryland, Baltimore County First floor of the Albin O. Kuhn Library 1000 Hilltop Circle Baltimore, MD 21250
Price:
Free and open to the public
Parking: Top Floor of the Walker Avenue Garage. This is adjacent to the Library. For more information see the Parking Map.
Visitor parking is available in metered lots with either single space mechanical meters or a pay and display station.
Mechanical meters are enforced year round Monday-Friday from 7:30 am until 9:00 pm. Meter fees are $.25 for each 15 minutes, quarters only, maximum time of 5 hours. Parking Services does not guarantee that change will be available on campus. The mechanical meters are located at the Administration Drive Garage.
Pay and display visitor parking is $2.00 per hour and payable by MasterCard, Visa or exact currency (no change provided). Pay and display parking is enforced Monday-Friday from 7:00 am until 7:00 pm. Pay and display visitor parking is located at Lot 7, Lot 9, Commons Garage first level and Walker Ave Garage top level.
A visitor with a disabled plate/placard may park in a metered space on Administration Dr Garage without cost for a maximum of 5 hours. The Pay and Display visitor pay stations are ADA compliant and visitors with disabled plate/placard will need to pay when parking in these areas.
If there’s one thing for certain, it’s that Baltimore designers have some fantastic workspaces. This is only evidenced by the growing number of Instagrammers out there tagging #bmoreAIGA100 on their #workspace photos this month.
So far, we’ve seen that many local creatives have multiple screens:
http://instagram.com/p/zCoI_JN2w0
some expansive workspaces:
http://instagram.com/p/ysn6O3RHii/
and even miniature workspaces with big visuals:
http://instagram.com/p/y0fCtbLLMH/
Speaking of big visuals, we’ve got some inspirational walls:
http://instagram.com/p/yu9mZ6qAtg/
a few ‘remote’ coffee shop spaces:
http://instagram.com/p/y5aydMvgQb/
and some well-appointed cubicles, too:
http://instagram.com/p/zAwgnJOx_i/
And this isn’t even half of the postings on Instagram, so go check out the rest with hashtag #bmoreAIGA100.
While you’re at it, snap a pic of your own #workspace and tag it on Instagram with #bmoreAIGA100. We don’t care if it’s messy and cluttered or clean and dust-free; just do it by February 28th and you’ll be entered to win one of two year-long Skillshare subscriptions!
BONUS ROUND: Want to double your chances? Come up with a creative way to spell out #bmoreAIGA100 in your photo for a second entry.
Oh, and here’s one last Instagram with a lovely Bmore feline to leave you feeling cozy on a cold winter’s night:
rmadar1: My lil corner workspace, lots of orange, lots of cat. #bmoreAIGA100 #workspace #Baltimore
Kicking off AIGA Baltimore’s Design Week 2014 at ADG Creative, the Ravens in-house marketing team sent in three of their best to talk about how Baltimore’s own NFL team thinks creatively about design and marketing. Bryan McDonough, Heather Blocher, and David Lang discussed how they target Baltimore football’s wide audience across print, digital, social media, and broadcasting in a fascinating presentation, all while showing off their flashy Ravens World Champion rings.
Marketing the Ravens
Emphasize consistency. That’s the team’s key secret for seamless collaboration. The Baltimore Ravens’ marketing team only joins forces with outside agencies occasionally. Almost all efforts take place in-house, even broadcasting. As a graphic designer for the Ravens, presenter Bryan McDonough described the group as being a “mini agency”.
The marketing team has to “churn and burn”—they’re ready to react. While most NFL creative teams ask “how does this help us sell tickets?”, the Ravens are always sold out, allowing more creative freedom. Each campaign piece still must work across all platforms, including print, digital, broadcast, and environmental. The organization also reaches a wide and inclusive audience of women, men, families, young fans, and seasoned fans.
If that wasn’t enough of a challenge, the NFL has strict geographical marketing regions when it comes to things like print collateral and tv ads. The Ravens are uniquely sandwiched between two neighboring teams: the Washington Redskins and the Philadelphia Eagles. Luckily, there are no borders on the digital front. Even with the NFL limiting Ravens from print and tv in areas geographically associated with other teams, the web provides ways to market beyond these borders without regional terms.
How an idea becomes a campaign
Each season’s new campaign begins after the playoffs. The success of the players on the field decides when to shift focus to the year ahead. At this point, the design team’s first deadline is printing the next season’s tickets by May. During the summer months, the team prioritizes working with Ravens sponsors.
Ravens’ 2014 season tickets
From the very beginning of each campaign, the marketing department’s creative process includes senior management, creative, marketing, and board representatives. Several concepts are narrowed down to the best two or three ideas. The public relations, digital, and print teams collaborate to select which concepts should move forward. Polished into solid presentations, the concepts must be clear to the point where the executives—who don’t necessarily have creative backgrounds—understand the direction and ideas.
In charge of overseeing these efforts, event presenter Heather Blocher serves as Senior Manager of Advertising & Branding. Heather started as an intern and officially joined the marketing group as her first job after college, a prime example of how team members are given opportunities for growth.
The one surefire way to win a campaign? Have Coach John Harbaugh buy in. If creative and marketing have his vote, then the players and fans approve. John can be tough, however. Even with free lunch in the cafeteria, Harbaugh recently put everyone on a diet. No more “Pizza Friday.” It’s just salad. At least everyone gets cake after a win, though. On the other hand, losses do affect morale. The next day everyone is bummed right along with the fans—and a lot goes into game day behind the scenes.
How to “Play Like a Raven”
Give it your all, 110%, on and off of the field. That’s what it means to “Play Like A Raven”—the team’s tagline and annual marketing campaign since 2009. Praised by coaches, players and fans, the phrase remains one of their most successful campaigns.
Focusing on the human element and illustrating the off-the-field “Play Like A Raven” concept, new photo shoots show players training and behind-the-scenes. Quotes from Coach John Harbaugh integrate into the final design to reflect this more personal tone. Landscape posters using this imagery portrayed the players as heroes and role models. The posters were envisioned as inspirational collectables distributed at stadium practice events leading up to the season opening.
Their 2014 marketing both hints back to the original “Play Like A Raven” campaign and pushes the idea to the next level. Fan shots became a major part of the previous campaign’s success. The logical next step uses these even more expansively. Updated photography showcases the vast Baltimore cityscape. A new style guide allows visuals to easily translate from print to web, mobile, and broadcast as the team continues to improve the level of consistency.
Taking the campaign online
Hashtags for the Baltimore Ravens were once inconsistent with mixed messages and sources. Fans generated some with others in the marketing department. For example, #relentless is not specifically related to the Ravens alone. Rather than join these existing and wider conversations, their own threads were started specifically for the Ravens’ team. David Lang, as the Ravens’ Senior Digital Media Manager, discussed how he oversees the website and digital presence, including social media and broadcasting.
David Lang, discussed how he oversees the Ravens’ website and digital presence.
Tackling the confusion, the 2014 campaign includes just one hashtag: #playlikearaven. Since the Ravens are a newer team, creating an abbreviation like the Redskins hashtag—#HTTR for Hail To The Redskins—was deemed less meaningful and effective. Instead, #playlikearaven was trademarked. Beginning in 2014, posters and promotional materials added #playlikearaven, and this encouraged players and fans to share virally on social media.
The marketing team found creative ways to involve the players and the rest of the organization as the official hashtag gained popularity. The most positive and encouraging Facebook posts, tweets and photos were printed after sifting through thousands of social media posts. Displayed at the Ravens’ cafeteria entrance, these images help connect the staff and players with their fans. This interactive element that goes beyond an online “like” or “retweet” reinforces the idea that the Ravens marketing is not just a one-way conversation.
Outside of social media, President of the Baltimore Ravens Dick Cass is a driver for old school methods. Even though holiday cards are still printed, the marketing team did take to the streets late one night. With permission, the team stenciled graphics across the city using an environmentally safe paint from Germany to engage with their fans. But most often, the Baltimore Ravens leave street-level tactics to the fans themselves. They’re the ones who do guerrilla marketing best.
Shannon Crabill is a New Media Specialist at T. Rowe Price. Outside of the Internet, you can find her dancing, riding her motorcycle and binge-watching home improvement shows on HGTV. Tweet her at @shannon_crabill.
Brian E. Young is an art director and magazine designer by day and artist by night. When not painting, he’s helping unlock imaginations via his blog and The Uncanny Creativity Podcast. Ask him anything: sketchee.com.
B’More Creatives, a fellow Baltimore creative network, is once again putting on their Un-Company Picnic for creatives’ families, friends, and even pets. This event is sure to be a hit of the season. It’s not to be missed! Make sure to register soon.
This November, to highlight the contributions made by the many designers in Charm City, Edwin Gold, professor of Communications Design and director of Ampersand Institute for Words & Images, is curating a special exhibition featuring the very best logo designs by Baltimore creatives to be displayed in the UB Student Center Gallery.
The exhibit, which is to be on display for three months, opens with a reception for the designers and friends. Further information, including the panel of judges and instructions for mounting are to be finalized in coming weeks.
To nominate your favorite local designer (or yourself), contact Ed: egold@ubalt.edu and include name, contact information, and samples of your favorite logo designs.
This week, the Baltimore Design School had their repurposing ceremony at the old Lebow Clothing Factory. What is the Baltimore Design School? It is a new public middle-high school offering fashion, architecture and graphic design. The school has its first year under its belt with a 6th grade and 7th grade class. They will be continuing to add 6th and 7th graders to get to a full set of students through grade 12. The redesigned building will include art galleries, studios, classrooms, computer labs and fabrication facilities. Until the building is ready, the students are studying at Winston Middle School. Check out the Baltimore Design School’s website for more information (something to surely keep an eye on)!
Principal Joesph Freed talking in front of the students.Large cyanotype artwork made by the students for the new building.
The new AIGA Baltimore logo
AIGA Baltimore’s Brand (New) Identity Guide
