Strong, Bright, Useful & True: Recent Acquisitions and Contemporary Art from Baltimore
Exhibition Opens Tuesday, April 15 | Ongoing through September 6
This spring, Derrick Adams, Jerrell Gibbs, Joyce J. Scott, and other contemporary Baltimore artists shaping the national and global arts landscape will be featured in Strong, Bright, Useful & True: Recent Acquisitions and Contemporary Art from Baltimore at the Irene and Richard Frary Gallery at the Johns Hopkins University Bloomberg Center in Washington, D.C. Strong, Bright, Useful & True features a selection of new acquisitions made through the Johns Hopkins University Art Collecting Committee, which includes faculty, staff and students, in collaboration with BmoreArt Connect + Collect. These new acquisitions will be shown alongside works from the campus collection at Hopkins. On view April 15 through September 6, 2025, the exhibition illustrates the vibrancy of Baltimore’s contemporary art scene and the University’s longstanding commitment to elevating creative culture in and around the region, including through its acquisition efforts.
Showcasing a broad spectrum of media—including painting, sculpture, time-based media, and photography—Strong, Bright, Useful & True includes works by globally recognized and emergent artists such as Adams, Gibbs, and Scott, as well as Nakeya Brown, Se Jong Cho, Brandon Donahue-Shipp, Oletha DeVane, Erin Fostel, Phaan Howng, Kei Ito, Linling Lu, Edgar Reyes, Soledad Salamé, Bria Sterling-Wilson, and René Treviño.The exhibition’s title is inspired by the inaugural address of the first Johns Hopkins University president Daniel Gilman, who in 1876 proclaimed Hopkins’ simple aim “… to make scholars strong, bright, useful, and true.”
“This exhibition represents our mission at Johns Hopkins to build bridges between the broader Baltimore and Washington, D.C. communities through programming at the nexus of art, culture and policy,” said Cybele Bjorklund, executive director of the Hopkins Bloomberg Center. “The Hopkins Bloomberg Center provides a phenomenal platform to amplify the contributions of Baltimore artists to the country through their thought-provoking work.”
“Visitors to the exhibition will experience works from today’s leading artists who work and live in Baltimore, as well as opportunities to discover the city’s emerging artists who are already starting to be represented by blue chip galleries and within the collections of major art institutions worldwide,” said Caitlin Berry, director of the Irene and Richard Frary Gallery. “Johns Hopkins’ stewardship of Baltimore artists across a broad range of perspectives, artistic traditions, and disciplines tells a multigenerational story about one of the most vital and energetic artistic communities in the country. The exhibition expands upon this narrative by revealing the profound impact the city has as a major incubator of innovation and creative expression on the national and international stage.”
Exhibition highlights include Derrick Adams’ Interior Life (Woman) and Interior Life (Man) (2019), part of his 2019 series “Deconstruction Workers”; Brandon Donahue-Shipp’s Basketball Bloom (Spectrum) (2024), which emphasizes community and place, two themes that are central to the exhibition; and Phaan Howng’s Monstera Mash (2024), which focuses on ecological stewardship.
Strong, Bright, Useful & True is the first presentation of contemporary artwork at the Irene and Richard Frary Gallery, which was inaugurated in October 2024. While advance reservations are requested, admission to the gallery is free and open to the public.