The history of public art in Baltimore’s schools can be categorized into three periods—each shaped by a different mix of public policy and private groups:
Broader trends in art education, school building and state and federal policy towards public art (particularly the federal art in architecture program in the 1960s) also shaped the artworks Baltimore has today. This study focuses primarily on the Baltimore Percent for Art program as most of the remaining public artworks date from this period.
Between 1964 and the late 1970s, the program was subject to controversy and debate over a variety of issues, including:
Despite these issues, the collection of public art that exists within Baltimore’s public schools represents a tremendous opportunity to celebrate our shared cultural heritage while supporting the education of our city’s children. With appropriate care and stewardship along with outreach and education, these artworks can find new audiences among students and the neighborhood residents around the schools.
Key Questions
In 1896, the Maryland Institute established in Rinehart School of Sculpture, the first graduate-level art program of its kind in America, with a bequest from sculptor and former student William Henry Rinehart, administered by trustees of the Peabody Institute. The first class included sculptors Edward Berge, J. Maxwell Miller, Hans Schuler, Grace Rinehart (niece of William Henry Rinehart), Mabel Carpenter, Helen Warner and Rachel Marshall (Hawks).
Note: I have some details on art education in 1840s Baltimore that may be interesting or I may want to cut this whole section to keep the study from getting too long.
In December 1898, the Baltimore Sun reported on a speech by Johns Hopkins University president Daniel C. Gilman before the Public School Teachers' Association calling for an “association be formed In Baltimore for the purpose of decorating with suitable pictures the walls of the public schools.” Gilman is quoted saying:
When the Teachers' Association asked me to deliver an address I said: 'Yes, but first let me see one of your newest and best schools.' I went to No. 7 grammar school, at Eastern and Montford avenues., and was very well pleased with it. The building was good and modern and there was no fault to be found with the arrangement of the rooms, the light nor the ventilation. But the walls did look so bare! It occurred to me then what a difference a few pictures would make—pictures with some meaning to them, that would teach the children something and promote study and research.
Gilman continued to suggest installing photographs of Westminster Abbey, the Acropolis, and "well-known sculptures." He assured the teachers that, following the example of municipal art organizations in New York and Philadelphia, he had conversations about the issue of art in schools with "several gentlemen of means" and shared his plans to form an association in Baltimore.^1
True to his word, just one month later, in January 1899, Daniel C. Gilman became the founding president of the Municipal Art League (later the Municipal Art Society) with a board of directors including Josias Pennington and John W. Garrett. The group had no facility of their own but organized lecture programs at the Hollins Market Hall, Cross Street Market Hall, Broadway Institute, and the McCoy Hall of Johns Hopkins University. Board meetings took place at the homes of members, such as the Theodore Marburg's mansion at 14 W. Mount Vernon Place.^2
That spring, the Municipal Art League selected Public School No. 4 at Hanover and Lee Streets as the first school to be "beautified under their direction" initially by contributing funds to the public to the public school committee of the Arundell Good Government Club before that group merged into the Municipal Art League. Miss M. Louisa Stewart chaired the committee which also included Mrs. William Reed, Miss Elizabeth T. King and Miss Cannon. The Sun reported on their efforts at Public School No. 4 on November 18, 1899 to promote an open house that afternoon, writing:
In decorating Public School No. 4 the committee first had the walls tinted attractively, relieving the glare of the lavish white walls. The avoid any interference with school work, the tinting was done on Saturdays and after school hours on Friday. After this was finished, pictures and casts, copies of famous works of art and photographic reproductions of well-known scenes were placed upon the walls of the different rooms and corridors. The pictures and casts were all chosen with the view of being attractive to the children and of developing their artistic instincts. They are grouped, too, in the different rooms with reference to the ages and studies of the children. […] The decoration of Public School No. 11, Jefferson and Bond streets, is to be undertaken next by the committee. Funds for the undertaking have been supplied by the Decorative Art Society. One of the rooms will be decorated with a collection of flower pictures, contributed by Miss Steuart's class at the Maryland Institute. Many of the other pictures which are to be placed in the building have already been purchased, and it is probably they will be hung some time next week.^3
In February 1900, the Municipal Art League worked to beautify English-German School No. 1 at Pennsylvania Avenue and Dolphin Street. In January 1901, the group worked on Primary School No. 37 on Patterson Park Avenue. In April 1901, Joseph Packard, the president of the Baltimore school board, Alcaeus Hooper, who served as Mayor from 1895 to 1897, and B.B. Owens, Supervisor of School Buildings, met at Grammar School No. 71 at Bond and Jefferson Streets "to examine the results of the efforts of the Municipal Art society to improve the appearance of the public school of the city." The Sun reported on remarks from teacher who explained "their charges were impressed by the pictures, liked to look at them and wanted to know what they were all about, while those with a talent for drawing frequently tried to reproduce them." Joseph Packard is quoted:
It is an education itself to have these pictures here to show the pupils what beauty really is and what they should strive to attain when they set about improving their own minds and homes. Children are imitative and impressionable, and it is a wise thing to accustom them from their earliest years to models which can serve them as guides instead of permitting them to form their ideas from what they may pick up at random. The society has done a good work in this matter and deserves to be complimented.
Unfortunately in October 1906, the members of the Municipal Art Society were dismayed to discover that painters employed by Baltimore Building Inspector Edward D. Preston had painted over the "artistic color scheme" on School No. 37 with a "stretch of green and drab." The Sun reported that the "attendant controversy between the Building Inspector and the school authorities furnishes another illustration of the lack of co-operation between municipal departments." The Sun continues to quote the reaction of Mrs. William M. Ellicott, the chair of the committee that raised the funding for the decoration of School No. 37:
No. 37 was our model school, which we hoped would be used as an example of artistic coloring for other schools. The Municipal Art Society spent a great deal of money on the school, and even bore the expense of coloring the walls, which is generally done by the city. This was done on account of protecting the children's eyes as well as for its artistic value. [...] It is greatly to the interest of the public that this work not only be fostered, but that it be protected, and that the committee of the Municipal Art Society be in cordial co-operation with the city and school authorities.
In other cities work along this line has met with hearty support of the municipal and school authorities. We deeply regret the occurrence and hope that a better understanding all around and a more cordial support of the society in its work will prevent such mistakes in the future.^4
Preston denied responsibility for the issue (arguing that school officials had selected the colors and placed School No. 37 on the list to be painted) and refused to repaint the building to match the original colors. Despite this setback, the Municipal Art Society persevered working to raise a $5,000 fund for decorating public schools in 1909 but the challenges of preserving their investment may have contributed to the Municipal Art Society shift to focus on public art in parks and broader urban beautification efforts in the 1910s and 1920s.^5
Note: I think a shift in their priorities took place but I don’t fully have the evidence to support it.
Other local art initiatives appeared in this period although few have such direct and substantial connections to public art in schools. In 1914, the Baltimore Museum of Art was established. In 1919, the Friends of Art was founded (a group that later merged with the Municipal Art Society.^6 In 1924, William Sener Rusk wrote the first public guide to Baltimore’s public artworks: “Art in Baltimore: monuments and memorials” publishing by the Norman Remington Company. In 1929, the Baltimore Museum of Art’s new building opened to the public.
Note: I have an account of a mural installed at Margaret Brent in 1922 being described as the first mural in any Baltimore school. I need to go back and dig into that account in more detail.
In 1933, a statewide committee appointed by R.J. McKinney, Maryland administrator for the Public Works of Art program of the National Civil Works Administration, reviewed and approved for public buildings across the state. In Baltimore, murals were proposed for schools including the Polytechnic Institute, Paul Lawrence Dunbar Junior High School, Catonsville High School, Forest Park High School, Western High School, Garrison Forest Junior High School, Patterson Park Junior High School, Francis Scott Key School, and the Montebello Demonstration School. Other public buildings in Baltimore and elsewhere included Kernan Hospital, the Municipal Museum, the Flaghouse, the Harriet Lane Home for Invalid Children, the Flaghouse, and the Harford County Courthouse in Belair.
The members of the review committee were Hans Schuler, Dr. Eleanor Spencer, Dr. George Boas, Leon Winslow and R.J. McKinney. The proposal for Dunbar "elicited favorable comment from the committee" along with advice to "the young Negro artist to tone down the coloring." The Sun described the piece, writing:
Divided into three sections, the mural shows the evolution of the Negro race.
>The center panel includes a group with a central figure dressed in the bizarre headdress of a medicine man, while above his head are two great hands beating a tom-tom. Another panel depicts a scene on a Mississippi levee, with a river steamer in the background, a Negro strumming a banjo, another trundling a bale of cotton along the wharf and high in the background is a religious note int he form of a white-haired Negro, with wings, blowing a trumpet. The third panel shows the present state of the Negro. Modern buildings form a background for Negro figures depicting a scientists, artist, musician, architect, writer and a mother holding an infant.^7
Between 1935 and 1943, the the Works Progress Administration (WPA) Federal Art Program employed more than 6,000 artists who created more than 2,000 murals, 17,000 sculptures and 100,000 paintings in and on public buildings around the United States.
In 1932, the Municipal Art Society merged with the Friends of Art, retaining their original name, but naming their gallery and offices the Friends of Art House. Over the next several years, the group organized a variety of exhibitions and lecture programs that helped to promote art in schools and the Federal Art project. These included exhibits on the “Arts and Crafts of Schoolchildren” (1934), the “Arts and Crafts of Public and Private Schoolchildren of Baltimore City” (1935), works of the Federal Art Project (1938), and a children’s art contest organized by Alvin Schwartz (1939).
Baltimore was not the first city to pass a public art ordinance. The inspiration for the program came from Philadelphia where, in 1959, the city approved the first one percent for art ordinance in the United States.
In January 1965, the Sun reported:
The still fledgling Civic Design Commission, charged with enforcing a new law providing for ornamentation of future public buildings, decided yesterday not to exempt an $850,000 school project as requested by the Department of Education.^8
That same year, the National Endowment for the Arts first provided funding for the Art in Public Places Program (later renamed Visual Artists' Public Projects) supporting the incorporation of art into public structures.
Implementing the program in Baltimore, however, continued to be a challenge. On March 10, 1966, the Sun reported on the Civic Design Commission’s frustration with the continued absence of clear guidelines:
Clearly exasperated with the city solicitor's office for delaying adoption of legal procedures to implement the nearly 2-year-old 1 per cent-for-art law, the Civic Design Commission yesterday voted to withhold approval of all future construction projects until workable guidelines are provided. To date, the commission has given conditional approval to about 50 projects, with the understanding that artists would be hired and paid in accordance with the type of contract finally adopted. [...] For a while last year, the Baltimore chapter of the American Institute of Architects held out for procedures that would allow the architect of a municipal structure to keep up to 10 per cent of the amount allocated for the artwork. This was seen as necessary to cover the architects "administrative costs."
Ultimately, a compromise was reached where 1% of the budget was "set aside for artistic embellishment" and a separate amount (up to 10% of the artist fee) should be paid to the architect for supervision or administration. Unfortunately, the city solicitor was slow to take action in approving the guidelines. The Commission had also been forced to defend the requirement from several efforts to carve out exceptions for the new city morgue and pathology research center. Mayor Theodore McKeldin sent a letter to the commission supporting their effort:
Because I believe so strongly in the importance of creating a beautiful city, I am reluctant to see exceptions made in an ordinance which has that as its goal.^9
In February 1968 , the Sun reported on a display featuring the design of the high school in Clifton Park :
The design of the Senior High School No. 40 to be built in Clifton Park is being displayed at the American Association of School Administrators Convention in Atlantic City. The display includes a model and four exhibit panels … transcription incomplete
In November 1968, “ACTION DELAYED ON SCHOOL ART: Sculpture For Walbrook Would Cost $40,000.”^11
In December 1968, the Sun reported under the headline “NO-ART PLANS ARE ASSAILED: Schaefer Scores Exemption Of Portable Classrooms,” writing:
The president of the City Council criticized the Civic Design Commission yesterday for exempting eight portable classroom buildings from the 1-percent-for-art requirement.^12
In 1969, Sun art critic Barbara Gold added her voice to those of local politicians expressing concern over the cost of the public artworks commissioned under the new law:
Baltimore's Civic Design commission recently approved a contract under the city's "1 percent for art" law for mosaics made of metal, glass, marbles […] Yet—the Civic Design Commission has approved three projects for one of its own members: Bennard Perlman did a $2,400 mural over the entrance to the skate house at the Patterson park ice rink. He was given a commission for work on a school in 1967, but the Board of Ethics ruled against the award. Now action on a third award, a $33,000 contract for work to go on the outside of the Women's Detention Center, has been deferred until City Council President William Schaefer goes to the Board of Ethics to ask for more liberal rules governing contracts with city employees and commission members. […] Few things could be more distressing in this day and age than a commission for a full-size bronze figure of a young girl with flowers (cost $10,000) for a junior high school. Surely the city has enough pigeon roosts already.
Note: Gold continues to repeatedly criticize the quality of the artworks in schools in the 1960s and 1970s—although unlike most observers who focused on the modernist sculptures, in this example, she dismisses a figurative sculpture as a “pigeon roost.”
In 1969, the Sun published a letter from artist Betty Wells defending the city’s 5-year-old ordinance:
The Sunpapers have published articles reporting that some politicians are concerned about money spent for art on Baltimore's public buildings under our 1 per cent bill. Perhaps these men are a bit nearsighted when they fail to visualize the benefits Baltimore and…^13
In June 1969, the Sun reported under the headline “How Much Is That Picture on the Wall?: 'One Per Cent for Art' Can Be $90,000, and Local Artists Benefit” reflecting a continued focus on the cost of the program:
The Baltimore city law requiring that 1 per cent of the costs for every city constructed building be spent on art to embellish that building has now been an ordinance for more than five years. Sculptures, mosaics, paintings, murals, and ceramics have been added to schools, recreation centers, playgrounds, fire stations…^14
In 1972, the Government Services Administration (GSA) Art established their Art in Architecture program requiring one half of one percent of the construction budget on select Federal buildings be dedicated to public art. In 1973, Baltimore established the city’s first mural program with grant support from the NEA.
In fall 1973, Councilman Emerson Julian introduced a bill to exempt city schools from the requirements of the percent-for-art program, effectively ending the program since most of the commissions were located in schools.
Bennard Perlman, a local artist who helped to establish Baltimore’s percent for art program in 1964 and who had written the “1 P.C. Art in Civic Architecture” handbook, wrote a long op-ed for the Sun explaining the history of the program and raising a defense.
Perlman noted that in nine years the program had commissioned 150 works of art, approximately two-thirds in public schools. Soon after the 1964 passage of the bill, Dr. Laurence G. Paquin, then superintendent of schools, reportedly “indicated his enthusiasm for the art law by pointing out that an environment of beauty stimulates learning:”
"Some people might wonder if such expenditures for esthetic reasons can be justified in the face of other critical needs of the school—needs such as new lighting, new fenestration, new floor coverings, new facilities and the like. ... It seems to me that those who might take this view are missing an important point. Children, like adults, react to the environment in which they find themselves. It seems eminently logical and desirable that every effort be made to raise environmental standards—and by so doing the level of taste in matters of artistic expression."
For an example of a much-loved public artwork in a city school, Perlman cites the mural glass walls at Commodore John Rodgers Elementary School on Fayette Street, designed and executed by Gyorgy Kepes, chairman of the visual arts department at MIT. Architect Van Fossen Schwab, saw the mural as:
a constant joy to the inhabitants—a joy to the students and faculty during the daylight hours and the members of the community during the hours of darkness, when the murals would become part of the fabric of the city […]
The principal of the school, Harold Katz, echoed the enthusiasm of the architect:
The impression that I have is that the school staff, parents, pupils and others in the community are delighted with the artwork. I've heard nothing but positive comments about it. Our children love to go to the library to see the brilliant colors on the carpet. It's breathtaking! I don't know if there is a direct, positive correlation but circulation of books in the library has increased.
Perlman also cited the influence of the program on national public art policy, quoting a letter from Nancy Hanks, chairman of the National Council of the Arts in Washington to Mayor William Donald Schaefer:
We continued to be indebted to you and the city of Baltimore for providing a working example of the values to be derived from an effective one per cent for the arts.^15
In November 1973, the Sun published a board editorial defending the program, writing:
Good art is something which can offer visual excitement to children, something that relieves the drabness of school pavement and long corridors, something creative to which they can relate in a subjective way. Baltimore is one of the few cities which has paid attention to the importance of art as part of the school environment, and many Baltimoreans may well desire to have the continual exposure of children to art in their school lives. If the state can be persuaded to adopt the city's rule, all well and good. But to eliminate the city's contribution without anything to take its place would make our schools poorer than they already are.^16
In a December 1973 column, Sun art critic Barbara Gold summarized current issues with the percent for art program and called for the program to be terminated, writing:
Councilman Emerson Julian (D, 4th) has introduced a bill to exempt city schools from the 1 per cent system entirely and thus effectively abolish the system since most of the commissions for it are for schools. Councilwoman Barbara Mikulski (D., 1st) has introduced a compromise bill that would place a $15,000 ceiling on money spent for ornamentation of new city buildings. And I just can't get excited about the issue any more. The whole thing has become an annual charade. Artists and architects go one and on about the wonders of esthetic effects on children, and the kids keep running by the esthetics without even bothering to look. Opponents keep arguing it's a shame to spend money on art when schools need repairs and children need hot lunches. The members of the council keep trying to strike a compromise between looking like philistines and cutting the bill the way they'd really like to. Nobody is looking at the facts. Nobody is looking at whether or not the prices paid for the works of art are realistic. Nobody is looking at the works themselves. Nobody is looking at how those works and the artist show make them are selected. […] An exciting idea, one that could have been so beneficial to Baltimore, has been distorted beyond recognition or redemption. I've seen all the art works, and nearly all of them are terrible. They are overpriced, and their creators have been selected by what comes to seem more and more like some sort of secret cabal. An angry meeting of artists last winter forced a sort of artists' registry on the local American Institute of Architects chapter in an attempt to open that selection process up, but the registry has not made any appreciable dent in the mysterious wall around what getting commissions is all about. I close the column with a clear statement: I'd like to see the boondoggle ended. If that makes me a philistine, I gladly join the ranks. Flogging the dead horse of 1 percent has become a bore.^17
In December 1975, the Sun reported on a sculptural fountain at Federal Hill Elementary School asking the classic question for nonrepresentational modernist artworks (“What is it?”):
The kids think it looks like a rabbit, a robot, a tree, an iceberg. Or maybe a monster, an airplane or a king surrounded by his court. And even though some parents and community leaders in South Baltimore would rather the abstract bronze fountain in front of Federal Hill Elementary School be somewhere else far away, the children who go to the school seem to like the sculpture. […] Mary Frances Garland, the president of the South Baltimore Community Coucil, thinks the fountain is ill-conceived. "We're concerned about children getting hurt on it... I pass it every day and I see youngsters climbing on it." she said. When asked what she thought the piece represented, she said, "It's just ugly and dangerous." […] The fountain was created by the late Edmund Whiting, a nationally known sculptor who taught at Franklin and Marshall College in Lancaster, Pa. George F. Horn, the art coordinator for the city school system, said the person who could tell how much the fountain cost could not be reached yesterday afternoon, though he was willing to venture a guess that the city paid about $35,000 for the piece. Mr. Horn said he likes the fountain and thinks it serves an educational function. "They [students] become fascinated with things of this type," he said.^18
In February 1976, Tylden Streett began work on an even more fantastic installation of sculptural aircraft at Falstaff Middle School. The Sun reported:
”When the Falstaff Middle School decided to convert an old gym into a cafeteria, money was available under the "one per cent for art" program to commission something. Mr. Street was approached originally to do a mural or fresco of some sort on the walls. ”I thought that was a horrendous idea," he says. "That was the last thing that space needed. The kids would have looked at the mural once and forgotten it. What the room obviously needed was something to fill up all that vertical space overhead. To me, that's a very oppressive atmosphere to eaat lunch in. So I proposed filling it up with fantasy aircraft." To enhance the mood Mr. Streett hopes the planes will create, two quotations will be emblazoned on the facing walls of the gym: "Imagination and invention can carry us as far as we wish" on one side, and "I am irresistible and swift as the wind" on the other.^19 Note: The Sun account includes a lot more detail about Streett’s artistic process and the design.
In 1976, proposed changes to replace the city percent for art law with a new statewide requirement sparked renewed controversy over the process of selecting artists and artworks. Stephens Berge submitted a letter to the Sun responding to an earlier letter by John B. Mitchell protesting the proposed changes, writing:
”I wish to take issue with John B. Mitchell for his letter to the editor. He says that the competition for selection of art for public buildings is open to all artists. But what they pick from these competitions is decidedly biased. The use of "distinguished national and local art experts" on the nominating panel insures that only nonrepresentational and abstract art be accepts. Yet Mr. Mitchell considers this a fair way to pick art. […] Art should not need "experts" to administer it. Engineering projects or internal combustion engines need experts because they function in mysterious ways. But art—except when it occasionally alludes to something not in the education of the beholder is totally visible and its value lies in our response to it. […] What they fear is not a dictator but a change of dictators. Richard Micherzinski has seen to it that a very large part of the work created for the project is non-representational art. I know of only two which have subject matter—a sculpture by Reuben Kramer and murals by Joseph Shepard. If the federal judges succeed in keeping the controversial Sugarman sculpture from being placed by the federal building I shall applaud." Stephens Berge
In 1977, the controversial George Sugarman sculpture was installed at the federal building in downtown Baltimore.
Note: The Sugarman sculpture is not directly related to public art in schools but is a good example for illustrating the continued resistance to modernist sculpture and a backlash against public funding for the arts that continued into the 1980s.
In 1979, City College High School reopened after a major renovation and new artworks featured prominently in reporting on the improvements on August 26, 1979:
Revamped with work by 13 artists decorating its walls, courtyard and entrances, City College High School, at Loch Raven boulevard and 33rd street, will reopen its doors this fall. One per cent of the $7.5 million renovation budget was allocated to the creation of artwork following a citywide Art in Architecture program. The art here ranges from welded steel to carved wood, fiber arts and paintings.^20
Of those 13 artists 10 were from Baltimore.
In March 9, 1980, the Sun reported on the state of funding for public arts:
Some, such as those erected near federal buildings under the General Services Administration's "art in architecture" program, are funded wholly by U.S. Taxpayers. Under that program, one-half of 1 percent of construction costs are set aside for what Don Thalacker of the GSA's fine arts division calls an effort to "humanize" federal buildings too often dismissed as ugly or depressing otherwise. […] But many of the modern sculptures have sprung up in response to a matching federal grant program called "art in public places," sponsored by the National Endowment for the Arts. Since its start in 1966 it has dispensed more than $5 million, and local businesses, citizens and government have chipped in much more. ”The whole ideas is to make art much more accesible, so you can encounter it without a special trip to a museum," said Pat Fuller, coordinator of the arts endowment program,”^21
In 1980, Baltimore hosted Joan Adams Mondale on a tour of Baltimore’s public artworks and galleries, as the Sun reported:
Get ready, Joan of Art is coming. No, the wife of Vice President Walter P. Mondale won't be riding a white charger. She will, though, be touring Baltimore by car next Sunday. Joan Adams Mondale, who has justly earned the nickname linking her to Joan of Arc by traveling throughout the United States to demonstrate her informed and enthusiastic interest in public art projects […]
The tour included a stop at School 33, a former elementary school built in 1893, that re-opened as a art center for South Baltimore on July 15, 1979. The renovation was funded by the Economic Development Administration, the Comprehensive Employment Training Act and other federal sources.
The Sun continued to detail Joan Adams Mondale’s itinerary including a, “Driving tour of murals from the "Beautiful walls for Baltimore" project, works commissioned under the city's "1 Percent for Art" ordinance, and sculptures which have been federally funded” ending at the Kromah Gallery, 1203 Druid Hill Avenue. In conclusion, Mrs. Mondale is quoted:
”Giving people access to the best... is the true meaning of art education.”^22
In June 1980, a special two-day workshop entitled “Baltimore, the Public Art Process at the Municipal Level” was held at School 33 with speakers including George Sugarman, Kenneth Snelson, Norman Carlberg, Reuben Kramer, Jay Brodie, Paula Rome, Bennard Perlman, Ms. Albright and Ms. Jacquot—“all involved in dialogues about the city's support of art.” The workshop was part of a larger “preconference” for the 11th International Sculpture Conference in Washington, DC. The preconference also marked the publication of a “handsome booklet” by Leslie Freudenhalm published by the Maryland Institute to document the city’s “numerous sculptures at public sites” entitled "Baltimore's Public Art, 1969-1980.”^23 On October 19, 1980, the Sun published a letter by local artist Hilton Brown protesting the selection process for artists creating works for the city’s new subway:
I was never informed, nor were most the artists I know in this city, and state, about a subway art competition. If Maryland artists are not informed about such competitions, then how can we actively participate? Were we purposely excluded? If so, why?^24
On January 3, 1981, the Sun reported on cutbacks in funding for art education (“In times of austerity, art programs are first to go in schools”):
The problem of school arts programs being eliminated is a nationwide one. (In Baltimore, though art programs have been accelerated in some schools, such as the "new" City College, traditionally a liberal arts high school, and at the new School for the Arts, instruction in art is a curricular step-child at most other public schools.) […] One reason that art departments and classes have generally been the first area cut when budgets are tight is that they are isolated—they have never been integrated into the educational process. In some states, an increasing number of local school districts have lumped the arts with other disciplines into one larger department. This keeps the arts from being singled out and ensured that cutbacks will be across the board.^25
On June 14, 1984, Jack Dawson reported for the Baltimore Sun on a speech Mayor William Donald Schaefer made before the 450 delegates to the annual American Association of Museums, quoting the Mayor:
"I am absolutely convinced that cultural and economic development are completely interdependent. When business is strong, so are cultural activities, and the reverse is also true. [...] Cultural facilities are people magnets that bring vitality to our cities, a vitality that attracts business, tourists, local consumers and others. Our cultural facilities in Baltimore have also tended to stabilize neighborhoods and provide significant impetus to neighborhood revitalization."
Schaefer highlighted "Beautiful Walls for Baltimore" and other city programs as examples, continuing:
“There were indications that vandals might destroy the wall mural and other artifacts that were installed in ghetto neighborhoods when that project was unveiled in the early 1970s. But there are now more than 100 murals scattered throughout the city and very little vandalism has occurred." ”It didn't happen," Mayor Schaefer said. "There was no vandalism because they appreciated the art [as their own].” The mayor outlined a number of landmark projects in which the city took the initiative. They began with the "1 percent for art" formula on all public construction projects that was passed in 1964 when he was still a member of the City Council. The Mayor's Ball for the benefit of the Arts, which he created in 173, provided $100,000 last year for arts programs at the neighborhood level. The Mayor's Advisory Committee on Arts and Culture has been coordinating arts projects citywide since 1974, and the Artscape Festival, which was formed in 1982 to focus attention on the arts, drew more than 600,000.^26
In April 20, 1986, the Sun reported on the challenges of liability insurance for artists working with large scale sculptural works at schools and public buildings:
Since 1962, the GSA has commissioned more than 250 public works for federal buildings. These include Mr. Sugarman's steel construction in front of the federal courthouse on Pratt Street downtown, erected in 1977. […] In Maryland, "Artists are required to carry an all-risk insurance policy from the time they begin their projects until they're done and become the property of the state," said Cindy Kelly, program director of the art-in-public places program of the Maryland State Arts Council, which has commissioned six public art works since 1980. Huntington Block, president of the Washington, D.C. Based insurance company that bears his name. "Companies are afraid that children will fall of a work and will sue the artist for millions." he added that the cost of a liability policy for an artist has gone up five times since 1981.^27
In 1987, the Sun reported on a new exhibit of works by artist Anthony Caro, declaring “A New Freedom for Sculpture”:
"I think sculpture is in a wonderful position Just now," says English A sculptor Anthony Caro. "It's opening up as an important art form, and it has been secondary since Michelangelo. Now it has a chance of becoming Important.”^28
In 1987, the Baltimore Office of Promotion and the Arts was established. That same year, Henry Naylor wrote “Public Monuments and Sculpture of Baltimore” – a new guide to the city’s sculpture. In 1992, the Save Outdoor Sculpture program supported the first formal survey of the city’s public artworks. In 1993, the Adopt-A-Monument Fund was established, building on the efforts of the CHAP Monument conservation program and their Baltimore Bronze Project which had started conservation treatments of sculptures at Mount Vernon Place in 1981.
http://search.proquest.com/hnpbaltimoresun/docview/535960056/DA8DF1F1B69416DPQ/13?accountid=10750 http://search.proquest.com/hnpbaltimoresun/docview/538238687/DA8DF1F1B69416DPQ/20?accountid=10750