BMA Ball is sold out; After Party tickets went on sale September 20
(BALTIMORE – September 21, 2024)—The Baltimore Museum of Art (BMA) will celebrate another major milestone in its 110-year history with a spectacular BMA Ball and After Party on Saturday, November 23. In addition to live music, dancing, and dinner amongst the museum’s masterpieces, the BMA is presenting its Artists Who Inspire and Changemaker Who Inspires awards recognizing individuals who advance social justice and equity through their work. The inaugural Artists Who Inspire recipients are John Akomfrah and LaToya Ruby Frazier, two exceptional artists whose works invite us into critical dialogue about issues essential to our lives. The first Changemaker Who Inspires award will be presented to renowned civil rights lawyer and BMA Trustee Sherrilyn Ifill, in recognition of her powerful advocacy for social justice.
“We are thrilled to announce the forthcoming BMA Ball and After Party celebrating the groundbreaking achievements of our honorees as well as the power of art to both bring us joy and spur us to action,” said James D. Thornton, Chair, BMA Board of Trustees, and Asma Naeem, the BMA’s Dorothy Wagner Wallis Director. “These events are an opportunity to come together in a shared vision and to support the museum in its work to elevate artists and serve our many audiences through exhibitions, programs, and artist-centered initiatives. We are immensely grateful to everyone for their support and look forward to another 110 years of art experiences at the BMA.”
The BMA Ball is co-chaired by BMA Trustees Amy Elias, Michael Sherman, and George Petrocheilos along with Diamantis Xylas. Honorary co-chairs are Maryland Governor Wes Moore and First Lady Dawn Flythe Moore, Former Baltimore Mayor Kurt Schmoke and his wife Patricia, and R&B GRAMMY® winner John Legend. (Appearance not confirmed.) The After Party is co-chaired by BMA Trustee Darius Graham and Tonya Miller Hall, Senior Advisor of Arts & Culture, Mayor’s Office
Proceeds from the 110th Anniversary BMA Ball and After Party will help the museum continue its outstanding artistic and educational programs and expand upon its mission of fostering artistic excellence and social equity for the benefit of communities throughout Baltimore and beyond.
The BMA Ball is generously supported by Patricia and Mark Joseph, The Shelter Foundation; George Petrocheilos and Diamantis Xylas; the Sherman Family Foundation; and Toni and Dwight Bush, Janice and Richard Roberts, and Ann Dibble Jordan.
BMA BALL (6–9 p.m.) SOLD OUT
The BMA Ball kicks off with cocktails and music in the lavishly decorated Dorothy McIlvain Scott American Wing on the second level of the neoclassical building designed by the great American architect John Russell Pope. A seated gourmet dinner catered by Linwoods Catering will take place in the beautiful Cone Collection, European Painting & Sculpture, and Contemporary Art galleries. The inaugural Artists Who Inspire and Changemaker awards will be presented after dinner. The evening will conclude with dessert and dancing during the After Party.
AFTER PARTY (9 p.m.–12 midnight)
Dance the night away with DJ Tanz! Fabulously attired guests will enjoy sophisticated cocktails, delicious desserts, music, and a few surprises.
After Party early bird tickets can be purchased at artbma.org/ball beginning Friday, September 20. Tickets are $110 through October 15, then $175 after October 15. All non-Members who purchase After Party tickets will also receive a discount for BMA Membership.
John Akomfrah
John Akomfrah (b. 1957, lives and works in London, United Kingdom) is an artist and filmmaker whose works are characterized by their investigations into memory, post-colonialism, temporality, and aesthetics, and often explore the experiences of migrant diasporas globally. Akomfrah was a founding member of the influential Black Audio Film Collective and currently collaborates with Smoking Dogs Films. His works have been presented in numerous solo exhibitions, most recently at The Box, Plymouth, UK (2023); Schirn Kunsthalle Frankfurt, Frankfurt, Germany (2023); Smithsonian National Museum of African Art (2023) and Hirshhorn Museum and Sculpture Garden, Washington D.C. (2022). He represented Great Britain in the 60th Venice Biennale this year and participated in the Sharjah Biennale in 2023. He has also been featured in many international film festivals, including Sundance Film Festival, Utah (2013 and 2011) and Toronto International Film Festival, Canada (2012). He was awarded the Artes Mundi Prize in 2017 and a Knighthood for services to the Arts in the 2023 New Year Honours.
LaToya Ruby Frazier
LaToya Ruby Frazier’s (b. 1982, Braddock, PA) practice engages with social justice movements, cultural change, and the American experience through a wide range of media, including photography, video, performance, installation, and books. She often uses collaborative storytelling that captures the voices and stories of individuals represented in her artworks. Her prior projects have addressed topics of industrialism, rust belt revitalization, environmental justice, access to healthcare, access to clean water, workers’ rights, the nature of family, and communal history. Her work has been the subject of numerous solo exhibitions at institutions across the U.S. and Europe. In May 2024, the Museum of Modern Art in New York opened the first museum survey dedicated to her work, titled LaToya Ruby Frazier: Monuments of Solidarity. In 2024, TIME named her among the 100 most influential people of the year. Other recent accolades include the 2020–21 National Geographic Storytelling Fellowship and a commission for the Carnegie Museum 58th Carnegie International—More Than Conquerors: A Monument for Community Health Workers of Baltimore, Maryland 2021-2022—which will be exhibited at the BMA in November 2024.
Sherrilyn Ifill
Sherrilyn Ifill is the inaugural Vernon E. Jordan, Jr., Esq. Endowed Chair in Civil Rights at Howard University School of Law and a leading voice in the nation’s ongoing conversation about civil rights. Prior to this appointment, she served as the seventh president & director-counsel of the NAACP Legal Defense & Educational Fund, Inc. Ifill is a recipient of the Radcliffe Medal, the Brandeis Medal, the Thurgood Marshall Award from the American Bar Association, and the Gold Medal from the New York State Bar Association. She was elected to the American Academy of Arts & Sciences in 2019. In 2021, “Time” magazine named her one of the 100 most influential people in the world. She is also the recipient of numerous honorary doctorates. Ifill received a Bachelor of Arts degree from Vassar College, and a J.D. from New York University School of Law. Following law school, she served as a Fellow at the American Civil Liberties Union in New York and served for five years as an Assistant Counsel litigating voting rights cases at the NAACP Legal Defense Fund. She taught at the University of Maryland School of Law for several years beginning in 1993, and served as Distinguished Professor of Practice at Harvard Law School in fall 2023. Ifill is also a scholar in residence at the Museum of Modern Art. Her new book about race and the current democratic crisis in the United States entitled “Is This America?” will be released by Penguin Press in 2024.
About the Baltimore Museum of Art
Founded in 1914, the Baltimore Museum of Art (BMA) inspires people of all ages and backgrounds through exhibitions, programs, and collections that tell an expansive story of art—challenging long-held narratives and embracing new voices. Our outstanding collection of more than 97,000 objects spans many eras and cultures and includes the world’s largest public holding of works by Henri Matisse; one of the nation’s finest collections of prints, drawings, and photographs; and a rapidly growing number of works by contemporary artists of diverse backgrounds. The museum is also distinguished by a neoclassical building designed by American architect John Russell Pope and two beautifully landscaped gardens featuring an array of modern and contemporary sculpture. The BMA is located three miles north of the Inner Harbor, adjacent to the main campus of Johns Hopkins University, and has a community branch at Lexington Market. General admission is free so that everyone can enjoy the power of art.
