Lately, the art world is recognizing what many Baltimoreans have known for a long time: This city produces remarkable artists.

In March, the TENT museum in Rotterdam — Baltimore’s sister city in the Netherlands — debuted “Walk on By,” an exhibit curated by Creative Alliance Visual Arts Director Joy Davis that explores Black diasporic communities in the two port cities.

Boston’s LaiSun Keane gallery in May premiered “Baltimore to Boston: Neo Contemporary Art,” which centered on works by local artists including Ainsley Burrows, Heejo Kim and V Walton, the ceramicist who last week also celebrated her solo New York City debut, “I Find Rest.”

Then there’s “Strong, Bright, Useful & True,” the must-see exhibition at the Johns Hopkins University Bloomberg Center’s Irene and Richard Frary Gallery in Washington. The collection, on display for free through Sept. 6, is a treasure trove of works created by some of Baltimore’s finest artists, from Joyce J. Scott and Derrick Adams to Soledad Salamé and René Treviño.

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The exhibit is modest in size but packs a visual and emotional wallop, with roughly 20 works ranging from oil paintings and photography to a video installation. It’s a potent dose of exquisite talent from an area that can at times be overlooked, given its proximity to larger cities.

“Baltimore has a charisma that can’t be found anywhere else in the United States,” Caitlin Berry, director of the Frary Gallery, said during a recent visit.

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The exhibit’s title comes from an 1876 speech given by the Johns Hopkins University’s first president, Daniel Gilman. “Our simple aim is to make scholars strong, bright, useful and true.” That description felt apt, Berry said, when applied to the creativity of Baltimore artists.

The curation was patient and intentional, with pieces selected over the past two years by a committee of Johns Hopkins students, alumni, faculty and staff, along with help from BmoreArt’s Connect + Collect program. Other artists included in the exhibit: Kandis Williams, Kei Ito, Nakeya Brown, Se Jong Cho and more.

The recent wave of attention on Baltimore artists doesn’t surprise Berry. She thinks it could just be the start.

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“This is a long-overdue moment for Baltimore artists,” she said. “I hope they just continue to receive this critical attention, nationally and internationally, because the work is terrific.”

And, to think, it’s all just an $18 round trip on a Maryland Area Rail Commuter train away. Here are highlights from “Strong, Bright, Useful & True.”

Derrick Adams, ‘Interior Life (Woman)’ and ‘Interior Life (Man)’

Derrick Adams’ “Interior Life (Woman)” is on display at the Johns Hopkins University Bloomberg Center’s Irene and Richard Frary Gallery in Washington D.C.
Derrick Adams’ “Interior Life (Woman).” (University Collections, Johns Hopkins University)

Adams has earned his reputation as one of Baltimore’s busiest multi-hyphenates, from leading the arts nonprofit Charm City Cultural Cultivation to co-curating the Scout Art Fair, a welcome edition at May’s Artscape. So it’s nice to take a beat to appreciate some of the work that has made him an international name in contemporary art.

These stately side portraits, which come from his 2019 exhibition at New York’s Luxembourg & Dayan Gallery, appear like meticulously constructed collages, creating a snapshot of humanity bursting with depth and personality.

“When I deal with portraiture or things that are reflections of looking at communities, looking at people who I see in transit moving about their day, they are always the most inspirational subject for me,” Adams said.

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Phaan Howng, ‘Monstera Mash’

Phaan Howng’s “Monstera Mash,” a 7-foot-tall acrylic painting on stretched linen, is displayed near the entrance of the “Strong, Bright, Useful & True“ exhibit at the Frary Gallery in Washington D.C.
Phaan Howng’s “Monstera Mash.” (Poll Bravo/Johns Hopkins University)

Phaan Howng is often considering our relationship to plants, from her dad’s obsession with lawn care as she grew up in South Florida to the more recent deluge of “plant porn” on Instagram.

Her immersive, 7-foot-tall painting on stretched linen envelopes the viewer, recalibrating our relationship with nature by reminding us that this sprawling life form isn’t here merely for human entertainment or interior decoration.

“They have their beautiful ecosystem for a reason, and maybe we should not treat them as objects but more as living organisms,” said Howng, whose snake plant art installation recently debuted as a part of Station North’s Inviting Light public art project.

Jerrell Gibbs’ oil painting “Can’t let ’em see me cry” is part of “Strong, Bright, Useful & True” exhibit at the Johns Hopkins University Bloomberg Center’s Irene and Richard Frary Gallery in Washington D.C.
Jerrell Gibbs’ oil painting “Can’t let ’em see me cry.” (University Collections, Johns Hopkins University)

Jerrell Gibbs, ‘Can’t let ’em see me cry’

This oil painting by Jerrell Gibbs, a Maryland Institute College of Art alum, stopped me cold.

In such a small space (2½ feet by 2 feet), so much emotion is expressed as a Black male of indeterminable age covers his face with both hands under a running shower.

It immediately conjures numerous scenarios and questions in an observer’s mind — from the cause of the pain to wondering how long the subject waited for the moment to release it. The potential answers proceeded to shake me all over again.