Explore the creative vision of 24 artists at SPARK: New Light, presented by UMBC, Towson University, and PNC Bank, August 13 through September 25 at The Peale. SPARK: New Light will ignite your imagination. UMBC artists featured in this fifth annual family-friendly SPARK exhibition include Lynn Cazabon, Irene Chan, Adam Droneberg, Fahmida Hossain, Ahlam Khamis, Kathy Marmor (with Penny Rheingans), Lisa Moren (with Tsvetan Bachvaroff, Dan Deacon, and Woody Lissauer), Timothy Nohe, Corrie Francis Parks, Chris Peregoy, Foster Reynolds-Santiago. Special events will feature Kelley Bell, the UMBC Percussion Ensemble, and the Umbilicus ensemble.

Most prisons and jails across the United States do not allow prisoners to have access to cameras. At a moment when an estimated 2.2 million people are incarcerated in the U.S., 3.8 million people are on probation, and 870,000 former prisoners are on parole, how can images tell the story of mass incarceration when the imprisoned don’t have control over their own representation? This exhibition addresses the unique role photography plays in creating a visual record of this national crisis, despite the increasing difficulty of gaining access inside prisons.

In conjunction with the exhibition Prison Nation, the Library Gallery presents Portrait Garden, a display of works by Lynn Cazabon, professor of visual arts and director of the Center for Innovation, Research and Creativity (CIRCA), in the Library Rotunda. Portrait Garden is a metaphorical garden of ‘portraits’ of eleven women incarcerated at Maryland Correctional Institution for Women, a multilevel security prison.

In conjunction with SPARK: New Light, on display at The Peale, artist Lynn Cazabon will be in the gallery ready to record your winter memories to be added into the project Losing Winter, featured in SPARK and also on display at the Maryland Center for History and Culture. Sessions will be held on September 11, 17, 23, and 25.

The Center for Art, Design and Visual Culture presents Oletha DeVane: Spectrum of Light and Spirit, on display from September 22 through December 17. Featuring nearly 100 artworks, the exhibition is the first retrospective of celebrated Maryland artist Oletha DeVane, and traces the artist's extensive career, from her early paintings and works on paper to video artworks and interactive sculpture, including works on view for the first time.

The Center for Art, Design and Visual Culture presents the Opening Reception for Oletha DeVane: Spectrum of Light and Spirit, on display from September 22 through December 17.

In celebration of the grand re-opening of The Peale, and as part of the closing festivities for SPARK: New Light, artist Kelley Bell presents Window 26, an illumination of The Peale's second floor galleries from the inside, using artwork by Tawa Abiwa, Elizaveta Aleinikova, Kelley Bell, Cathy Cook, Danielle Damico, Eric Dyer, Jenee Mateer, Corrie Francis Parks, Timothy Nohe, Jules Rosskam, Alexi Scheiber, Evan Tedlock, and Beth Yashnyk. Window 26 will be presented two evenings, September 23 and 24, running from 8 p.m. until dawn the next morning.

In conjunction with the exhibitions Prison Nation and Portrait Garden at the Library Gallery and Oletha DeVane: Spectrum of Light and Spirit at the Center for Art, Design and Visual Culture, the galleries present a panel discussion, Art from the Inside, featuring Lorenzo Steele, Jr., Lynn Cazabon, Oletha DeVane and Tadia Rice, who will discuss their experiences working with incarcerated individuals and the importance of art in giving a face to those behind bars.

The Center for Innovation, Research and Creativity in the Arts (CIRCA) presents Irene Chan, associate professor of visual arts and affiliate associate professor of Asian studies at UMBC, who will discuss recent work including The Thomas Project (2022), a six part, multimedia work exploring the life of Thomas Sylvanus (aka Ching Lee, Ye Way Lee, Ah Yee Way), a 19th-century Chinese man who lived in the U.S. East Coast, was enslaved in Baltimore, and ran away to join the Union Army.