visit Baltimore : Buzz

Ever wonder why Baltimore has so many murals and where they are? This blogger answers the why and points the way to the where.

Here's an excerpt:

"I'm starting a regular feature to highlight them and this will allow me to mention other aspects of art in the process. Baltimore, Maryland has a Mural Painting Program that I did not know about. Evidently, this has been ongoing for 30 years! In 2008, through the program, CityPaint, there was a push to get 20 murals painted."

Read the entire post here.

Whether it was the mid-summer like heat or one of many other fun events happening around Baltimore last weekend that kept you from the African-American Heritage Festival, you're in luck! You can still get a taste of what the festival had to offer.

Here's an excerpt:

"This weekend the African American Heritage Festival was held in downtown Baltimore and we had the opportunity to see some stars come through. Here' some video of Robin Thicke, Fantasia & Marsha Ambrosious peforming."

Watch the videos here.

Summer break has officially begun! That's great for the kids, but can be rough on parents eager to get their children out of the house to burn off some of that excess energy. Geocaching could be just the thing according to this the Examiner's Outdoor Recreation blogger.

Here's an excerpt:

"We, as a family, have recently discovered geocaching. Geocaching is a high-tech treasure hunting game, one where seekers equipped with GPS devices go out to locate hidden containers, called geocaches. Given the coordinates and a few clues found on-line at one of the geocache websites, you seek out hidden caches placed by other gamers."

Read the entire post here.

Cycling enthusiasts shed a tear when the Tour Du Pont bike race hit the brakes more than a decade ago. They'll be pedaling for joy soon, if state officials and the Tour Du Pont's former promoter manages to bring a new weeklong cycling event to Maryland.

Here's an excerpt:

"Fourteen years after the annual mid-Atlantic cycling race Tour Du Pont abruptly ended, state officials and cycling enthusiasts are trying to bring a race to Maryland in 2012 that could generate as much as $40 million in annual spending.

Tour de Maryland would be a seven-day cycling event covering roads in all five regions of the state � Southern, central and Western Maryland; the Eastern Shore and the capital region, according to Terry Hasseltine, the state's director of sports marketing who is trying to position the race as a mid-spring precursor to the Tour de France."

Read the entire article here.

It's a gardener's paradise -- .that is if you enjoy walking through acres of carefully maintained formal gardens surrounding a beautifully maintained mansion -- Baltimore County's Ladew Gardens is a must.

Here's an excerpt:

"Open for the season, the Garden Rooms range in styles from the grand Great Bowl and the impressive Iris Garden (with its 400-foot stream) to the serene Water Lily Garden. The historic manor house, open for tours, boasts an amazing array of English antique furnishings and equestrian-themed paintings, all collected by Ladew.

It's taken two years, but the bust of Frank Zappa is finally on its way to the city of the quirky rock icon's birth. The statue, a replica of a bust located in Lithuania, was gifted to the city by fans in that country in May 2008.

Here's an excerpt:

"The copy of the original bust, which is standing in central Vilnius, was made two years ago with the thought of bringing it to Baltimore. Zappa, weighing more than a tone, will be taken to US by a sea transport by UPS company. "Our mission is simple � this is not even close to the risks that were taken by French, when they presented the Liberty sculpture to US," said UPS representative to Lithuania Vladas Lasas.

It is planned that Zappa will reach its hometown within a month. The opening of the bust will take place in Baltimore on 18 of September..."

Read the entire article here.

If you haven't been able to cop a ticket to a Stew dinner, here's a peek at a recent dinner and the trend that is spreading across the country.

"A Stew meal is not elaborate. The main course is soup; tonight it's a choice between vegan spring onion and rabbit with dumplings. Tickets to the event are $10 each. But there's more to this meal than the composition of a plate of radishes, or of the next course: spears of roasted asparagus, pleasantly salted, arranged to form squares that overlap at the corners.

Stew is the brainchild of the Baltimore Development Cooperative (not to be confused with the Baltimore Development Corp.), which was started in 2007 by three recent MICA graduates, all artists now in their late 20s: Scott Berzofsky, Nicholas Wisniewski and Nester. They wanted to use food to foster community and stimulate activism."

Read the entire article here.

The all volunteer organized and operated music festival happens in Baltimore July 22-25. The four-day event, presented by Wham City and devoid of corporate sponsorship, takes place at various locations throughout the city with music, theater, and video performances from hundreds of artists and bands from the Baltimore area and beyond.

Here's an excerpt:

' *Sniffle* Whartscape has really grown up, guys. This year the Baltimore music fest celebrates its fifth birthday with a sprawling lineup of approximately 435 bands over three days. See the almost complete lineup..."

Read the entire post (scroll down to the bottom of the page) here.

John Waters, the man whose films based in Baltimore helped give the city it's quirky reputation, has a new book out. He stopped to answer a few questions about "Role Models" and bad taste in America.

Here's an excerpt:

"It has been more than a generation since your films "Pink Flamingos" and "Polyester" established you as a champion of the trash-into-art aesthetic. But now that bad taste is so prevalent in America, does it still carryan artistic charge for you?

Bad taste per se does not, because today it's reality television and gross-out, big-budget Hollywood comedies. Everything we export � it's all about bad taste, so it's not new anymore. You have to know the rules to break them with happiness, and thank God my mother taught me proper table manners."

Read the entire Q&A here.

Baltimore director, Matthew Porterfield, whose second film "Putty Hill" was featured at this year's Maryland Film Festival in May, will soon make its way into theaters around the U.S. thanks to a newly signed distribution deal.

Here's an excerpt:

"It's good to start the day with good news: in this case, word that the young Baltimore director Matthew Porterfield's extraordinary second film, "Putty Hill," has been acquired for theatrical and home-video distribution."

Read the entire post here.

Kinetinauts lined up at the American Visionary Art Museum for the annual Baltimore Kinetic Sculpture Race a few weeks ago. This year's sculptures included a platypus, a sea monster and a gingerbread house among others. The man-powered sculptures make their way through a course consisting of hard surface, knee-deep mud and water. The WSJ ponders the artistic merits of the quirky race.

Here's an excerpt:

"The 45-year-old was getting the platypus ready for 15 miles of concrete, cobblestones, water and mud. The annual Baltimore Kinetic Sculpture Race matched people-powered creatures made of everything from tulle mesh fabric to recycled trash can lids.

"Some people think it's trash on wheels," says Theresa Segreti of the American Visionary Art Museum, the group that organizes the race. "But it's art."

Read the entire article here.

Check the WSJ slideshow of the race here.

Watch WSJ video of the race here.

We were busy looking for our happy place this week...here're a few tweets of what others found

@travelmd found the "Baltimore Harbor at Sunset .....my happy place http://bit.ly/dyr68w" and this "another happy place http://bit.ly/aTJLGK" 

@baltcommfdn "Three unsung #Baltimore community leaders honored by our new #giving circle http://bit.ly/9TMgra"


Don't see any of your tweets? Are you following @bmoremediame or @bmoremedia? If not, you should. You can also submit your candidates for the tweet of the week by email, on Facebook and Twitter.

To launch the latest tourism campaign, hundreds of Baltimoreans came together last Thursday to set the world record for the largest human smiley face. The event was a success, however, copyright prevented participants from dressing in yellow ponchos. They sported orange ponchos instead.

Here's an excpert:

"For 11 minutes and 32 seconds, 261 people stood at the Maryland Science Center plaza to form an orange and black smiley face to help kick off Visit Baltimore's new summer campaign, "Find Your Happy Place in Baltimore" and to set the new world record for the Largest Human Smiley.

"Baltimore makes us happy everyday, and we think the world's largest smiley face is the perfect symbol to kick off our summer travel season," commented Tom Noonan, president and CEO of Visit Baltimore."

Read the entire article here.

Baltimore-based Charm City Devils won the opportunity of a lifetime -- a 20-minute opening set for Bon Jovi. The band beat out thousands of other entrants and impressed Bon Jovi with one song.

Here's an excerpt:

"As part of their promotional efforts for this current tour, Bon Jovi has been holding the "Wanted: A Superband Tonight" contest at various venues. The contest lets thousands of acts compete for the opportunity to open for the band.

The winner for Wednesday's concert is the Baltimore group, Charm City Devils. It will perform 20 minutes of original music before Bon Jovi and special guest Fuel take the stage.

The band, fronted by lead singer John Allen, won on the basis of the song "Best of the Worst," a midtempo rocker that Allen describes as "heartfelt and self-deprecating."

Read the entire article here.

Staycation? Not for folks visiting Bmore. The number of tourist visiting the city jumped by 1 million from 2008 to 2009. Overall, the entire state experienced an increase in the number of people coming here for vacation.

Here's an excerpt:

"Maryland was one of five states nationwide that saw their number of visitors rise in 2009, according to figures released Tuesday by the Maryland Office of Tourism, The Baltimore Sun reports.

The report by D.K. Shifflet & Associates of McLean, Va., showed that Baltimore had 29 million visitors last year, 1 million more than in 2008, an increase of 3.5 percent."

Read the entire post here.