The Center for Art, Design, and Visual Culture at UMBC (CADVC) invites you to join the live webinar "Cockeysville to Baltimore" on April 1, 6–7 pm EST, for a discussion between artist Levester Williams and sound designer Dan Shields focused on the element of sound design in the context of Williams's work. The program will be introduced and asynchronously moderated by Lisa D. Freiman, curator of “Levester Williams: all matters aside.”

Levester Williams was involved in CADVC's exploratory research residency that allows artists and interdisciplinary collaborators to take advantage of scholarly resources and to build partnerships at UMBC and in the Baltimore region. Williams's residency developed into the exhibition Levester Williams: all matters aside, and the publication Cockeysville to Baltimore.

This event is online only, and registration is required at this link:shorturl.at/s5EVl.

You will be contacted at the email you provide with the link for logging on, and your contact information will not be shared. If you have any questions or concerns, please contact CADVC at cadvc@umbc.edu or 410-455-3188.

If you need any specific accommodations to experience an exhibition or one of our events, either online or in person, please contact CADVC at cadvc@umbc.edu or 410-455-3188 as soon as possible.

All events at CADVC are open for full participation by all individuals regardless of race, color, religion, sex, national origin, or any other protected category under applicable federal law, state law, and the University’s nondiscrimination policy.

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Header: “Conflux: Variation” video still, 2025, Shannon Collis & Liz Donadio, courtesy of the artists.(Description of audio, authored by the artists: a deeply resonant audio landscape builds momentum, merging field recordings of industrial machinery, trains, water, and wind with digital and analog synthesis. Layered low-frequency tones shift between foreground and background, aligning with the visuals. The soundscape evokes the essence of the visited sites and the interplay of natural and industrial elements.) 

Top: Levester Williams, “Shift, Sift, Swoosh Bods,” 2018, HD video, color, sound accompanied by interactive seating embedded with speakers: “for/four here/hair,” 2018 acoustic foam (polyurethane), polyvinyl chloride foam, epoxy resin, paint on MDF, plywood, transducers, speaker wire, steel, sound and other media; (In a gallery setting cast with blue light, a video projection spans a 20’h x 30’w wall. The video features a male-presenting figure standing in his underwear and a white vest in front of a white wall and next to a microphone stand holding a long white cylindrical object. From his mouth, a pink sculptural object protrudes like a large bubble gum bubble. In the foreground of the gallery, two black seats shaped like Pringles potato chips face the projection wall from below. They sit on a five-inch-high white platform on the floor and are embedded with speakers. On the left side of the gallery daylight shines in from the entrance.)

The Center for Art, Design and Visual Culture presents the early-career survey Levester Williams: all matters aside, an exhibition curated by Lisa D. Freiman, professor of art history at Virginia Commonwealth University

The exhibition will be accompanied by the first in CADVC's public art projection series with a new video art gallery set into the open amphitheater of the UMBC Fine Arts Building. There is more information on the projection series at https://umbc.edu/stories/exploratory-artist-levester-williams-marble/.

The Opening Reception will include a public program featuring Levester Williams, Michelle Diane Wright, and Lisa Freiman.

The exhibition will open for regular hours on Friday, September 20, and will continue through December 14.

Visitor Information

Admission is free.

Parking for the Opening Reception is free, available in nearby Lot 8. Please visit here for directions and additional information.

Header: Detail of video still of Nia Hampton in the vignette “Nia’s Embrace” from “dreaming of a beyond: Baltimore,” filmed at Mount Vernon Park Place in November 2023. Photo by Levester Williams. (Coming from behind, a hand with dark brown skin tone reaches around to the front of a marble column in a park-like setting. In the background a black and white marble border runs between a parallel strip of grass and a reflecting pool.) Body: A drone image of the Texas Quarry in Cockeysville, Maryland, one of the locations where Cockeysville marble is mined. Photo courtesy of Levester Williams. (Birdseye view of a circular bright teal body of water at the center of a marble quarry.) 

Thursday, February 29, 2024, 6-8 pm

The Center for Art, Design and Visual Culture (CADVC) inaugurates the "demo" of a new public video art projection gallery with work by artist Levester Williams, featuring his work "dreaming of a beyond: Baltimore" (2021-2024). The event will include a conversation between Williams and curator Lisa Freiman. Hot refreshments will be served. Showings of the work will continue on select evenings in late February and early March.

Images - 1. Levester Williams, "dreaming of a beyond: Baltimore" (2021-2024); 4K color video/video installation still (In a park-like setting, a person with dark brown skin tone sits embracing a white marble column from behind. Their hands touch the stone. Their face, obscured. They wear a light pink sweatsuit and brown boots. In the background, a nude fountain sculpture spouts water from the center of a pool of water. White marble also forms the border around the pool.)