Community Calendar

THE ROCKY HORROR SHOW

MUSIC, LYRICS & BOOK BY RICHARD O’BRIEN

OCTOBER 31 – NOVEMBER 8

This sexy cult classic will make you shiver with antici…pation. It’s time to break out your fishnets and join MET for some campy humorous fun! Squeaky clean couple Brad and Janet have some car trouble and are forced to seek refuge in the gothic castle of the mad scientist Dr. Frank-N-Furter. Upon their arrival, Frank-N-Furter and his kooky staff of Transylvanians open up the couple’s minds in ways they never imagined.

Back for its second year, Abbott and the Big Ten Conference are hosting the We Give Blood Drive competition to entice students, alumni, fans, and community members to rally around their Big Ten school to donate blood, save lives, and address the country's ongoing critical blood shortage.

From August 27 to December 5, anyone eligible to donate blood can do so anywhere, anytime in the U.S. to count for their school. The school with the most donations at the end of the competition will receive $1 million to advance student or community health.

New this year, everyone who donates or attempts to donate blood throughout the competition will receive an exclusive, limited-edition, Homefield-designed T-shirt specific to their school. To receive the shirt:

1. Show up to donate
2. Submit your donation (or attempt to donate) at BigTen.Org/Abbott or by texting DONATE to 222688 (ABBOTT).
3. Click the link sent to your email
4. Use your redemption code
5. Your shirt will be shipped to the address of your choice. 

Last year, the University of Nebraska won, and is using the funds to advance student health on campus. The University of Maryland is competing this year and will host several blood drives on campus and in the surrounding area throughout the competition. To find a blood drive near you, please visit: https://bigten.org/abbott/maryland

This focus exhibition of 10 works explores the relationship between burning fossil fuels—namely, coal—and the emergence of European modernism. Drawing on research conducted by climate scientists and art historians, the exhibition presents a range of paintings and works on paper by Henri Matisse, Claude Monet, James McNeill Whistler, and others to explore the ways that their artistic practices and style emerged, in part, in response to widespread pollution in London and Paris.
Presented as part of the Turn Again to the Earth environmental initiative.

More than 50 works on paper investigate how artists working in Europe and French-occupied northern Africa watched and participated as nature became a resource for people to hoard or share.

Drawn from the BMA’s George A. Lucas Collection, this exhibition of 19th-century art foregrounds the many ways that human relationships, including imperialism and capitalism, affect the environment. Deconstructing Nature is organized thematically, focusing on five environments and the ways artists explored them in their work: The Desert, The Forest, The Field, The City, and The Studio.

Born and raised in Baltimore, George A. Lucas (1824–1909) spent most of his adult life immersed in the Parisian art world and amassed a personal collection of nearly 20,000 works of art. In 1996, the BMA, with funds from the State of Maryland and the generosity of numerous individuals in the community, purchased the George A. Lucas Collection, which had been on extended loan to the Museum for more than 60 years.

In this focus exhibition of approximately 20 photographs, prints, drawings, and textiles, the natural environment is a source of creative inspiration worth celebrating and protecting.

Works by artists such as Winslow Homer, Richard Misrach, Charles Sheeler, and Kiki Smith, among many others, depict the elements of air, water, earth, and fire and address broader themes of ecological awareness and preservation. These themes range from how artists have used visual language to convey the act of locating oneself in nature; works that depict natural forms through the physical integration of environmental components; and artists’ commentary on sites of environmental disaster, the sociopolitical ramifications of human impact, and the potential of symbiotic healing for this planet and its occupants.

For thousands of years, East Asia’s cultures have viewed human life as part of a much larger system that encompasses the natural world. Drawn from the BMA’s collection, this exhibition boasts more than 40 objects—from magnificent ink drawings to beautifully crafted stoneware and poignant contemporary photographs and prints. They bring into the galleries the mountains and seas, wild and supernatural animals, and plant life that are extensive across East Asian imagery and often carry symbolic meaning.

Works on view include robust 13th-century ceramic vessels, delicate porcelain, carved jade, intricately sewn textiles, and large-scale photography; collectively, these artworks represent the impulse to fully understand the natural world as foundational to our existence, as shaped by human life, and as an enduring metaphor of survival.

On View: September 12 - December 6 (closed Oct. 17 & Nov. 25 - 29)
Gallery Hours: Tuesday - Saturday, 11 a.m. - 8 p.m.

The work in this exhibition compresses and expands expectations of depth as moderated by a post-image visual culture. The artists adhere to neither medium nor dimensional restrictions, but manipulate the viewer’s relationship to the image as a temporal document, compressed and fractured, through the singular eye of the lens. This expectation, no longer warranted in the age of computer generated images, becomes a fallacy of both the eye and of the language used to comprehend it. The image is untethered from representation and logical spatial association. Spatial continuity and discontinuity run amok in playful fracture--the work pushes and prods the amorphous opening left in the wake of this rupture; what was flat is unmoored of grounding, what was solid is now compressed.

Reception September 11 following the 6:30 p.m. lecture.
For parking information visit towson.edu/parking/visitors

September 10 - December 6 (closed October 17 & November 26 -29)
Gallery Hours: Monday - Saturday, 11 a.m. - 4 p.m.
Opening reception Wednesday, September 10, 7:30 p.m.

How have recent upheavals—from the pandemic to global conflicts, amplified by media—reshaped our private lives? How do personal memories become collective history? In a world forever changed, how do we find our way forward? Elaine Qiu’s awe-inspiring installation of painting, video, and sound invites visitors into a multi-sensory exploration of communal consciousness, connection, and healing in a fragmented, post-pandemic world.
For parking information visit towson.edu/parking/visitors

2nd Annual Rotunda Rocks Returns to Hampden Neighborhood this Spring
Family-friendly Night of Rockin’ Fun Begins May 3 and Runs Every Friday Until End of September

Whether you like to jam to rock, folk, blues, Indie, Latin or reggae, there is something for everyone as the second annual Rotunda Rocks concert series returns to Hampden this spring/summer (711 W 40th Street). This family-friendly FREE concert series, presented by MCB Real Estate, features live music on the plaza and a street festival atmosphere with delicious local food and drinks, fun games and local vendors on Fridays, 6-9 p.m. beginning May 3 and running until September 27. Rotunda Rocks is open to the public and welcomes families and pets. A portion of proceeds from beverage sales benefits the Maryland SPCA. For more information, log onto Rotunda Rocks | The Rotunda (rotundabaltimore.com) or call 410-662-0104.

SCHEDULE OF BANDS:
May 3 Mambo Combo (Latin and tropical rhythms)
May 10 Strykers Posse (reggae)
May 17 Go Dog Go with special guest Garage Sale (garage rock and hot rockin’ Surf)
May 24 Harlan County Kings (original rock)
May 31 Patrick Alban & Noche Latina (Latin and acoustic rock with a touch of salsa and South Beach feel)
June 7 Barry Prosser and the Vaguely Absurd (classic rock)
June 14 Monkton Road Band (rootsy folks laced with deep country)
June 21 The Natty Brohs (classic rock and blues)
June 28 The Soularites (SoulFULL reggae and Ska)
July 5 Kyf Brewer & Friends (hues of 60’s pop radio, British invasion, early Nashville, rhythm and blues and ancient Celtic melodies)
July 12 Justin Trawick and the Common Good (Americana-bluegrass, country and folk)
July 19 The Players Band (infectious rhythms and horn-heavy ska sounds)
July 26 Gaelic Mishap (Celtic rock)
August 2 Tumblehome (rock, soul, rhythm & blues)
August 9 Kurt Deemer Band (guitar driven rock & roll)
August 16 Barleyjuice (Celtic rock)
August 23 Red Sammy (honest, slow-burn Americana folks rock)
August 30 La Unica (Irish Latin)
September 6 ZOCKO! (surf garage)
September 13 Western Run (funked-up country rock)
September 20 Guys In Thin Ties (Alternative 80s band)
September 27 The Rock-A-Sonics (rockabilly, vintage country and atomic age rock n’ roll)

The Rotunda Welcomes Back Popular Family-Friendly Concert Series this May
3rd Annual Rotunda Rocks Begins Friday, May 2 and Runs Every Friday through Friday, October 3

Grab a blanket or dust off your favorite portable chair and head on over to Hampden this spring for the return of the popular family-friendly concert series, the 3rd Annual Rotunda Rocks. This FREE weekly concert series, presented by MCB Real Estate, features live music on the Plaza and a street festival atmosphere with delicious local food and drinks, fun games and local vendors and will take place Fridays, 6-9 p.m. beginning May 2 and running until October 3. (711 West 40th Street). Whether you like rock n ’roll, folk, bluegrass, Indie, Latin, Celtic or reggae music, there is something for everyone and the event is open to the public. Pets are welcome and a portion of proceeds from beverage sales benefits the Maryland SPCA. For more information, log onto Rotunda Rocks | The Rotunda (rotundabaltimore.com) or call 410-662-0104.