Community Calendar

Welcome to Baltimore, the city of charm and possibility! If you've recently found yourself in this vibrant community and are eager to make connections, our "Charm City Connections: An Improv Welcome to Baltimore" event is the perfect avenue. In this specially curated two-hour experience, we invite newcomers like you to explore the world of improv while forging new friendships.

Led by seasoned facilitators, this event offers a unique opportunity to break the ice, have a ton of fun, and dive into the art of spontaneous collaboration. We’ll begin with introductions and a boundary check-in, where we establish an inclusive and supportive space for everyone. Then, through interactive exercises and guided scenes, you'll not only discover the joy of improv but also connect with fellow newcomers on a shared journey of exploration.

Whether you're a seasoned improv enthusiast or a complete beginner, this workshop is tailored to cater to diverse backgrounds and experiences. No need to worry about fitting in—improv is the ultimate equalizer, bringing people together through laughter and shared creativity.

Come embrace the magic of improv, make lasting connections, and weave your story into the rich tapestry of Baltimore's welcoming community. Join us for an unforgettable experience where laughter knows no strangers and friendships are sparked in the spontaneity of the moment!

How our Flexible Ticket Pricing Works:

As part of our mission at Highwire Improv, we aim to make improv an art form that is simultaneously financiallly accessible to audiences and students and financially sustainable for performers and instructors. To achieve this, we offer three ticket options:

Free Registration tickets.
Pay What You Wish tickets.
List Price tickets.
The list price tickets represent a standard registration fee to cover event costs, including paying our instructors. Individuals are welcome to use this as a guide and decide to pay less or more than that amount.

Note that for some venues (such as Enoch Pratt Free Libraries), we may only offer free or donation based tickets to comply with space rental expectations.

About your instructors:

Misty Letts (she/they) stepped into the improv pool 6 years ago and has not looked back. She got her footing at Baltimore Improv Group (BIG) through curriculum and workshops from various BIG instructors, digging into opportunities to learn from talented performers including Don Fanelli (UCB), Kate Zelensky (UCB), and Travis Charles Ploeger (iMusical- WIT). She has also enjoyed playing with Maryland Improv Collective and can presently be found camped out on Highwire’s front stoop. Misty is a she is also a they/them and can be found on two wheels tooling about town, so drive carefully!

Sam Van Sant (she/her) began studying improv in 2010 at the University of Maryland, Baltimore County, where she earned her B.A. in Theatre (acting). She’s trained with the Baltimore Improv Group and has performed at a variety of theaters across the East Coast. She currently performs with groups including Babeprov, Sandcats, GirlTalk, and Dreamweaver. To Sam, improv is not solely about being funny – it’s about discovering what can be built together through creativity and openness. She especially loves improv that builds a story through honest characters navigating real(ish)-life challenges.

About Highwire Improv:

Highwire Improv is a 501(c)(3) non-profit arts organization based in Baltimore, Maryland. Our mission is to steward a community of artists committed to growth, collaboration, joy, and justice — in Baltimore and around the world — through improvisational theater.

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 training provides an in-depth look at the dynamics of elder abuse, including its definitions, risk factors, and the barriers older adults face in seeking help. Participants will gain insight into the behaviors of perpetrators, the complexities of victim decision-making, and the role that professionals and community organizations like CHANA can play in supporting older adult victims of abuse and neglect. Offers 2.0 Category I CEUs. Part of the year-long “Focus on Dementia” series developed in conjunction with AgeWell Baltimore.

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

On View: October 24 - December 6 (closed November 25 - 29)
Gallery Hours: Tuesday - Saturday, 11 a.m. - 8 p.m.
Reception October 23 following 6:30 p.m. lecture.
Artist talk October 29 at 12 noon in the Holtzman MFA Gallery

Enjoy the works of Alexis Ibry and Zachary Diaz.
Alexis Irby collects physical evidence of places and moments, bringing them together into a constellation of disparate memories. Her sculptures encourage a sense of absurdity by documenting aspects of reality in ambiguous combinations. She highlights the interconnectedness of the physical world and the encompassing layers we cannot fully perceive in her exhibit Manifesting the Unheard Layers of Reality.
Zachary Diaz presents MOTUS an interplay of color, movement, and texture through large-scale oil paintings, drawings, and monotypes by blending intuition and intention. The artworks emerge as intuitive puzzles, balancing spontaneous marks with deliberate layering to evoke emotional responses. With a classical training foundation and heavy influence of abstract expressionist techniques, Diaz’s work uncovers hidden narratives with seemingly simple marks.