Local artist Amalie Rothschild criticized the Baltimore Museum of Art for its "blatant rejection and exclusion" of local artists at an arts forum Wednesday night.
"That's what's bugging the artists in town and has for years and years and years," she said to applause from an audience of about 75 which met at the Episcopal Diocesan Center on University Parkway to hear a discussion on museums, galleries, art and artists.
Officials of local museums and galleries spoke earlier, but Mrs. Rothschild's talk on behalf of artists, the last on the program, brought the meeting to life.
"There has been a scanty offering of invitational, group or one-person shows in recent years," she told the group. "They rarely show any works from [their] collection of regional art, and they have quite a large collection."
A former member of the BMA's board, she recalled that the museum once had an annual regional show, changed it to a biennial, then gave it up. She also said there used to be an artists' committee to help plan museum shows of local artists, and a sales and rental gallery that showed regional artists.
"Those are all discontinued," she said.
"All of this is causing universal discontent among the large artists' community," she said. "There are hundreds and hundreds of practicing artists in Baltimore."
"I don't agree at all that the museum turns its back on regional artists," responded Jay M. Fisher, the museum's curator of prints, drawings and photographs, and its representative on the panel. He earlier pointed out that contemporary art is only one of the museum's areas of interest.
"Out of 14 exhibitions a year, maybe three or four . . . have to do with contemporary art," he said. "Usually one and sometimes two of those have to do with regional art. I don't think . . . that's such a bad record."
He added that members of the museum's staff participate in activities of other art organizations, including non-profit galleries Maryland Art Place and School 33 Art Center. "All of us on the staff are deeply committed to art, and we're deeply interested in artists."
Yesterday, Mrs. Rothschild said the most important thing the museum could do is reinstate regional juried shows. "The artists working in Baltimore today don't have . . . that exposure at a prestigious museum. That's very important to an artist."
Wednesday's event was sponsored by the Baltimore News Network, a non-profit news dissemination service.