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Moving On Up

The Maryland Art Place moves to a new home on Saratoga Street.

By Cara Ober | December 14, 2010

On Maryland's cultural landscape it is difficult to find another arts institution as well respected as Maryland Art Place. Known as MAP, the nonprofit art center offers educational programming as well as curated and democratically selected exhibitions in a photogenic, modern setting that would make any Chelsea gallery jealous—high ceilings, three large galleries, professional lighting, steel and glass accents, and shiny wood floors. Despite its swanky appearance and professional clout, MAP is also somewhat of a well-kept secret, nestled into a back corner of Baltimore's tourist-laden Power Plant Live! complex.

The center is poised to reinvent itself in the heart of Baltimore's newest arts district. This month, MAP moves back to its first permanent home at 218 West Saratoga Street. Originally envisioned as an 'Avenue of the Arts' by Mayor Kurt Schmoke in 1994, the Westside Arts District is flanked by Camden Yards, Lexington Market, and the University of Maryland Hospital and Medical School. In recent years, the area has attracted cultural centers including the Bromo-Seltzer Arts Tower, the Hippodrome Theater, and Everyman Theatre's new home, as well as independently-run art and music venues like the Sub-basement Artist Studios, the H&H Arts Building, and the new Current Gallery.

“MAP has been a cornerstone in Maryland’s arts and cultural communities for nearly 30 years, presenting a range of thought-provoking exhibitions, intelligent programming, and excellent educational opportunities and resources for emerging artists, writers, and curators,” says former executive director Julie Cavnor, who worked at Maryland Art Place for twelve years, until 2009. “The value of these contributions—which incidentally have always been made available to the community free of charge—are tremendous and undoubtedly far-reaching.”

According to Suzi Cordish, current chairperson and MAP board president from 1991–1999, “Maryland Art Place stands at the edge of a significant rebirth. Our move sets the stage for MAP’s participation in sustainable cultural development in Baltimore’s Westside district. In reclaiming our original home at 218 West Saratoga Street, we effectively redefine our role in the cultural life of the region.”

MAP's board members voted unanimously this fall to return to its former home on Saratoga Street, after close to ten years in its current location. Cathy Byrd, executive director, hopes the move will “re-energize MAP’s vital mission to support and promote contemporary art and artists, while raising MAP’s profile on the local, national and international stage.” Byrd plans for MAP to expand its role as a cultural contributor to include a number of ambitious community-centered projects, linking it to trends in the greater contemporary art world.

MAP has changed locations and directions a number of times in its history. The organization's first home was in a renovated industrial space, adjacent to the Inner Harbor, after the Maryland State Arts Council granted funding to founding members in 1982. Following a rent increase in 1984, MAP operated out of a number of temporary locations and developed public programs that were successful without a permanent base: a Critics' Residency program, a state-wide exhibition series, and Diverse Works, the first performance residency for interdisciplinary artists.

In 1986, MAP moved to Saratoga Street and, in 1998, it purchased the 20,000 square foot space. Renovations in 1991 provided a large gallery for exhibitions on the first floor, a theater in the basement, and offices and rental spaces on the upper floors. MAP occupied the five-story space until 2001, when it moved to the Power Plant Live! site. In the past ten years, the Saratoga Street building has been home to the 14Karat Cabaret, an informal theater space for ongoing performance, music, dance, film, and video screenings, as well as Operation Safe Kids, a center providing teen outreach services in Baltimore.

Laure Drogoul has been director of the 14Karat Cabaret since 1989, as well as a board member and artist advisor at MAP. Drogoul believes that the move to Saratoga Street will allow MAP to reinvent itself. “The mission of MAP has always been to be an art PLACE, as opposed to simply a gallery space that supports artists and contemporary art,” says Drogoul. “The move back will broaden MAP to create an actual space for the community in terms of studio space, educational programs, meeting places and put it in a better position to continue to grow a vital cultural community.”

Barbie Hart joined MAP's board in 2006 and was elected president in 2009. “MAP intends to develop 218 West Saratoga Street into a cutting-edge multi-use space that will serve as a resource for the city’s creative community,” explains Hart. “MAP will anchor and energize greater cultural activity in the Westside district.”

“We’ll be making changes in phases, eventually transforming the entire building at into a multi-layered creative space,” says Byrd. “New programs beginning in 2011 include The POD Project, a unique bi-level ‘pod’ rental space especially designed to accommodate for-profit entrepreneurial start-ups, newly formed nonprofits, artists, designers, writers, engineers, architects, fashion designers, and other creative individuals and collectives, as well as a number of community-centered and regional exhibitions such as Westside of the Future, planning for Fall 2012, in partnership with D:center, and a MAP East Coast Annual Exhibition, a new annual juried exhibition opportunity.”

Michel Model, vice president and board member since 2005 adds, “As we move, MAP’s role will involve more intense engagement with both artists and community. A significant goal is to design and build out MAP’s physical space as a creative resource center that effectively forwards the careers of local and regional artists, and creative entrepreneurs in all disciplines. We plan to enrich MAP’s surrounding environment through initiatives that invite the participation of the Westside’s arts, business, residential, and transient communities.”

Hart agrees. “MAP’s core mission is still very much at the heart of what we do. Our move to 218 West Saratoga Street renews our commitment to develop a dynamic environment in which artists can flourish and to facilitate rewarding exchanges between artists and the public.”

MAP's first exhibition in its new home will be a three-part installment of The Curators Incubator program in 2011. The 14 Karat Cabaret will continue its operations from the basement of the building as usual.