Artscape, Baltimore's premier art festival, is this weekend

It's opens today and Sunday hours are til 8pm.  Partly it's an art fair for visual artists, where vendors sell their wares, but there are many complementary events in the performing arts, and many arts-related nonprofits exhibit and participate.

It's pretty cool usually, although I haven't been for a couple years.

-- Artscape

If you go Saturday, you can leave early and take in the Waverly Farmers Market and breakfast at Pete's Diner on Greenmount Avenue.  While I haven't been to the Dupont Circle Farmes Market for awhile, I've always thought that the Waverly/32nd Street Market in Baltimore is one of the best farmers markets in the region.

If you go Sunday, go a bit early and take in the Baltimore Farmer's Market, which is probably the biggest farmers market in the Baltimore-Washington region.

Artscape is sponsored directly by Baltimore City, but in an unusual organizational arrangement, the Baltimore Office of Promotion and the Arts is technically an independent nonprofit.  This helps them to sell sponsorships for events like Artscape, but probably also helps to limit the city's liability.  The nonprofit is controlled by the city through board and staff appointments.

In this piece I made some recommendations concerning cultural policy in Baltimore.