Inside/Out @ Evergreen

We’ve got a beautiful spot for outdoor sculpture exhibits here in Baltimore, at the Evergreen House. It’s the former home of railroad magnates, the Garrett family. An amazing estate, worthy of a visit in its own right, now owned and operated by Johns Hopkins Unversity. Inside/Out, Sculpture at Evergreen, curated by Julie Courtney, is the latest site-specific sculpture exhibit.

Other exhibits here featured work that challenged the landscape; this group is more subtle, more organic, still relating to the historical context of the estate.

Michelle Rosenberg's Call and Response fits that description perfectly: two simple birch wood structures, on opposite sides of a stream bed. One has a single horn/call button, and the other has six. The interior is wallpapered and is complete with brass labels; as would any mansion with a serving staff. The exterior resembles a bird-watching station or duck blind. Squeeze the single horn and you get a variety of responses from anyone in the opposite hut in return.

Near by is Matthew Geller’s Babble, Pummel and Pride -- you can never really escape nature -- and Bruno LaVerdiere’s eerie Sacandaga Markers.

To fully appreciate Alison Crocetta’s Tracing Influence, you should take the house tour and see the theater painted by the Russian costume designer Leon Bakst. Nonetheless, it does just fine on its own: cut vellum paper attached to the wall of the carriage house; it’s quite striking, as shown above.

Katherine Kavanaugh's work is a set of glass row houses, fixed to steel poles. This is a fitting juxaposition for Baltimore. The transparent and vulnerable circling the estate home? Be cautious of those in glass houses. This piece must look beautiful on a moonlit night.

Another piece I'd like to see at night is Suzy Sureck's Alice and the Looking Glass. Etched, mirrored plexiglass, with a light from above projecting the image on the wall. The black stage curtains add the mystery to this subtle piece.

Also on view is the twisted and twined recycled "industrial salvage and street litter" of Baltimore Irratic, by Susie Brandt and Kristine Woods. I like the idea, I wish it were formed into to a more interesting shape. Bartow+Matzger were still putting the finishing touches on their collaboration, Colloquiseum (I'll return), and Suzanne Bocanegra's After Jan Brueghel the Elder's Bouquet, 1607 is a suspended mix of twine, beeswax, fabric, and flowers, in a portion of the ruins of the estate's arboritum. The exhibit is on view through September 14th.