Live Music, Visual Art, Literature at African-American Arts Festival, Feb. 13-16
February 6, 2017
Contact: Public Affairs
Phone: 410.837.5739

In recognition of Black History Month, the University of Baltimore's Spotlight UB live performance series, joined by UB's Center for Cultural Diversity, the Black Student Union and Baltimore's Enoch Pratt Free Library, will host the ninth annual African-American Arts Festival at UB, Feb. 13-15. The festival will feature art forms ranging from live music to poetry and fiction. All events will take place in the Wright Theater in the UB Student Center, 21 W. Mt. Royal Ave.
The festival kicks off on Monday, Feb. 13, when Spotlight UB and the Enoch Pratt Free Library bring Rion Amilcar Scott to the UB campus to read from his collection, Insurrections. Scott, a PEN American Literary Award finalist and faculty member at Bowie State University, is the author of widely published short stories and was featured in Best American Essays 2015. Insurrections is his first collection of short stories, which all take place in the fictional Maryland town of Cross River, the site of the only successful slave revolt in American history. In a review, poet Hope Wabuke called the collection "an epic album, each story placed in musical accordance with the next to craft a complete, melodic whole." Scott's reading will begin at 6 p.m. and is free to the general public.
The festival celebrates Valentine's Day on Tuesday, Feb. 14 with "Steamy Morrison," a reading of romantic excerpts from Toni Morrison's novels. The passages were chosen by UB Prof. Diedre Badejo, who is teaching a literature course on the Morrison canon this semester. The reading takes place during her class time at 5:30 p.m., but is free and open to the public. Refreshnments will be available.
On Wednesday, Feb. 15, the Wright Theater will host the composer series Women in Jazz. This live music event features Amy K. Bormet, whose commissions include works for the Bohemian Cavern Jazz Orchestra and the Smithsonian Jazz Masterworks Orchestra; Helen Sung, a popular jazz front woman who has been performing in the Washington Metropolitan area for 20 years; and headliner Diana Wharton, composer of the Broadway classic For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide When the Rainbow is Enuf and founding member of vocal ensemble Sweet Honey in the Rock. This concert of renowned composers and performers will begin at 7 p.m.; general admission is $10 and student admission is $5.
The festival's final event, on Thursday, Feb. 16, is BlackScape, a showcase of vendors and performers that culminates in a performance of spoken word poetry, The Color of Truth. At 7 p.m., host Lady Brion, an award-winning performer and student in UB's MFA in Creative Writing & Publishing Arts program, will perform alongside a lineup of talented local poets and a painter, who will use the poetry as inspiration to create works of visual art live on stage. The BlackScape festival will begin at 6 p.m.; a reception will be part of the event. Tickets are $3 for UB students and general admission is $5.
Reduced rate parking is available on Spotlight UB event nights at the UB Maryland Avenue Garage, located on Maryland Avenue between Biddle and Chase streets, or at the Fitzgerald Garage on Oliver Street; a voucher will be provided at the box office, and the UB shuttle is available to transport patrons between the venue and the garage.
Complete details about the 2017 Spotlight UB season are available here. For more information, send an e-mail to spotlightub@ubalt.edu.
The University of Baltimore is a member of the University System of Maryland and comprises the School of Law, the Yale Gordon College of Liberal Arts and the Merrick School of Business