Where The Maps Run Out
Where The Maps Run Out is an exhibition that invites viewers to consider “the outermost peripheries of cartographic certainty.” Artists Kyoungho Isaac Kim, Chia-Hsiu Liu, Tim Moran, and Valentino Orlando all create works with different levels of abstraction which often delineate some sort of space. The theme for the exhibition grew out of a process of exploring the collective's work and unifying it under a theme of the re-imagining of maps, not as something that effectively guides, but that is limited and whose margins suggest a more conceptually ripe and liminal space. The exhibitions curator, Rui Jiang. describes the exhibitions as “not merely a departure from the known but an act of subversion—a quiet, insistent rebellion against the cartographic impulse to delimit, define, and control.” While some of the work is sure to be in the Hoffberger thesis exhibition in April at The Peale Musuem, it is exciting to see these MFA students take a bit more agency in the display and curation of their work in this space.
This is exhibition is not only well-curated but also installed in an equally lovely space. I first visited Atrium Art Space, which is nestled between Baltimore’s Old Goucher and Station North neighborhoods, on a sunny spring day. The light from the glass ceiling in the back atrium poured down upon a few paintings and refreshments. The natural lighting in a gallery space is a welcome surprise and departure from the typical gallery space-- though this renovated rowhouse from 1881 is anything but typical. The sunbeams launching down and into the gallery space is a rare pleasure, recalling such architectural gems of the gallery scene as Spencer Brownstone or Tanya Bonakdar in NYC. Programming has been happening here since May of 2024 and the space follows the lead of Baltimore galleries like Spare Room Gallery and CPM Gallery which take the model of a domicile turned exhibition space. There is a synergy between the visions of Atrium and Flying House, which both highlight the importance of uplifting the vibrant and full-of-potential art scene within Baltimore. Flying House describes themselves as a “Baltimore-based arts collective focused on connecting artists and communities." They've achieved this not just by putting on shows, but through workshops, interactive events, and talks such as the one they held at Atrium on March 15th. As Rui Jiang puts it, the collective’s “focus isn’t just on putting on exhibitions; we experiment with different forms of artistic production, constantly exploring new ways of working together…[and] creating a larger network of exchange.” It is this network that the group sees as vital in “[allowing] us to connect with audiences and communities in a way that feels organic and participatory.”
Similarly, Atrium says they are “devoted to enriching Baltimore's artistic and cultural landscape by championing and providing a platform for emerging artists based in Baltimore City” and for the better part of the last twelve months they’ve done just that. It has become typical for Atrium to open up new exhibitions with performances, workshops or artist talks to engage the space and community, and it was a delight to hear the panel-style talk that they hosted for this show. What follows are some of my insights resulting from the talk which featured four of the five members of Baltimore and MICA’s newest artist collective Flying House Arts Collective.
Flying House shot onto the scene with a force late last year, and with four of the five members graduating this Spring, there is a cohesion to the group aided by their academic proximity. On view at Atrium Artspace from March 1 to March 29, the exhibition is curated by the aforementioned Rui Jiang. Jiang is the only member who is not a part of MICA’s Hoffberger School of Painting, though fittingly she is completing her MFA in Curatorial Practices there. Her thesis exhibition, Trembling Grounds: Push-Pull Practice opened at nearby Area 405 shortly after Where The Maps Run Out.
Valentino Orlando was born and raised in Michigan, and since moving to Baltimore, he has observed parallels between the infrastructure of this city and his deindustrialized hometown of Lansing. The struggles Lansing faced with General Motors mirror the collapse of Bethlehem Steel in Baltimore and echo the broader trajectory of many “Rust Belt” cities.
In his book Manufacturing on the Move, Robert Crandall explains that the term "Rust Belt" uses rust as a metaphor referencing “the socially corrosive effects of economic decline, population loss, and urban decay attributable to deindustrialization.” While both Michigan and Baltimore have shifted toward newer industries—such as electric vehicle production and healthcare or tech, respectively—the scars of industrial collapse are still deeply felt. This environment shaped both the place Orlando grew up in and the one he now inhabits.
Valentino Orlando, Tin Stars, 2025, oil on panel 4’ x 4’
That architectural disarray is reflected in Orlando’s paintings: jumbled, collapsed structures that appear to pile upon themselves. His generally saturated and often bright color palette contrasts with the muted tones typically associated with dilapidated cityscapes. This visual choice may suggest a kind of optimism—a vision for a future not yet realized.
In his use of color and compositional energy, Orlando’s work recalls conversations with Neo-Expressionist artists like Wilfredo Lam. Both artists employ bold, contrasting colors to emphasize movement and tension within their compositions. While Lam’s vivid palette enhances a sense of ritual and vibrancy, Orlando’s energetic color choices heighten the chaotic quality of his urban landscapes. Both also blend abstraction with hints of recognizable forms, engaging in a kind of visual syncretism—where elements from their respective environments or cultural influences collide on the canvas.
During a talk, Tim Moran described a “need for tidiness” in Orlando’s work, particularly in the way he treats the edges of his paintings. I see that tidiness more in how the internal forms of his compositions seem to maintain their own outlines or spatial autonomy, rather than blending and bleeding into one another as seen in the work of the other three artists. While this tidiness may not be immediately obvious, Orlando’s recent experimentation with sanding down his paintings adds another layer to this idea. He describes this process as a form of "cheating," a way of reworking the composition that reflects, perhaps, a deeper desire to create order from chaos—an impulse that resonates with the optimism mentioned earlier.
Valentino Orlando, Blue Water Salvage, 2024. oil on board, 31.5” x 58.25”
Like Orlando, Kyoungho Isaac Kim’s paintings resonate with the visual language of urban environments, drawing inspiration from the layered, tagged, and marked surfaces shaped by street art. In discussing his work’s connection to the city’s visual texture, Kim noted: “The one way I can connect my work with everyone else [in the show] is the fact that I was responding to what I see in the city.” This recognition of graffiti as a visceral form of mark-making speaks to Kim’s exploration of identity through urban aesthetics.
Kim’s body of work includes both dense, maximalist pieces and more pared-down, monochromatic compositions. The latter, characterized by quick, gestural marks, evoke the spontaneity of graffiti tags, which Kim describes as “clutch” for him. He sees graffiti as an anonymous and communal practice—a symbolic map of the city where individuals assert their presence. This sense of layering and erasure parallels his painting process: “People just violently take over some things, and then someone else would come and cover it. Do it again and again. I feel like the layers of ugly walls were kind of like my experience being here. The things that don’t make sense are just on top of each other.”
Kyoungho Isaac Kim, Swirl, 2024. acrylic, acrylic pigment, Korean paper, charcoal, and oil pastel on canvas, 61” x 54"
Kim’s layering of marks, erasures, and raw textures evoke the conceptual practices of artists like Do Ho Suh and Xu Bing. Do Ho Suh’s exploration of memory and space through translucent, layered fabric installations aligns with Kim’s textured surfaces, where past actions and marks persist as a visual residue. Another parallel can be drawn between Kim and Chinese artist Xu Bing, particularly regarding the use of traditional cultural elements in a modern framework. Xu Bing’s use of waste materials to reconstruct classical Chinese imagery mirrors Kim’s incorporation of Korean iconography and materials—such as the mythical creatures and traditional Korean paper. Both artists reimagine their cultural heritage, using familiar motifs as the basis for new, layered interpretations. Kim’s process of layering and then tearing back the paper to reveal underlying marks underscores his meditation on identity: the constructed self as a palimpsest, constantly in flux.
During a recent talk, Kim mentioned the influence of Korean artist Hwang Chang-Bae, whose retrospective inspired him to experiment with applying acrylic paint to Korean paper—a material traditionally associated with calligraphy and ink painting. This shift in technique aligns with Marshall McLuhan’s assertion that “the medium is the message.” For Kim, the materiality of Korean paper is integral to his conceptual approach, merging his heritage with his present-day experiences.
The chaotic, collaged nature of Kim’s compositions, like the one depicted in the attached image, reveals a tension between abstraction and figuration, evoking the unpredictable visual language of urban spaces. The swirling blues and layered marks suggest a mapping of lived experience—echoing Kim’s idea of “maps running out” when familiar structures of representation no longer suffice. Ultimately, Kim’s work not only captures the aesthetic of street art but also translates it into a more complex narrative about personal and collective identity.
In positioning Kim’s practice within this broader context, we see how his engagement with material, cultural iconography, and urban aesthetics forms a nuanced dialogue between tradition and contemporary expression—between the ordered, symbolic past and the chaotic, improvisational present.
Left: Chia-Hsiu Liu, Jungle, 2024, oil and linen on canvas, 73” x 56” Right: Kyoungho Isaac Kim, Ancestor Tomb, 2024, acrylic on canvas, 57.75” x 17.75”
Chia-Hsiu Liu’s contributions to the exhibition stand out for their vivid color palettes and their connection to the artist’s environment, much like Kyoungho Isaac Kim’s work. With her vibrant and expressive style, Liu challenges the idea of intentional mapping. She notes that while she “never think[s] about maps when [she draws],” she considers her work “more related to [mapping]” than to maps themselves. This distinction is crucial, as Liu’s paintings do not function as navigational tools or direct viewers through space in a conventional sense. Instead, they evoke a sense of fragmentation and spatial organization, suggesting sections or impressions rather than a unified map. In this way, her works feel mapped rather than being maps themselves—abstract reflections of space rather than direct representations.
Liu’s practice also probes the intersection of cultural narratives and personal experience. In discussing her artistic development, she reflected on a course at Johns Hopkins titled Transnational Asian Art: Modernism in Motion, which she took alongside Kim. This course prompted her to confront the concept of identity, not as tethered to a specific geographic location but as fluid and dynamic—a concept shaped by movement, interaction, and personal history. As Liu put it, the course encouraged her to “face the [idea of] identity…more than…[a] specific place.” This perspective resonates with her paintings, which blend the personal and the collective, capturing fleeting impressions rather than fixed places.
While Liu’s works often hint at exterior spaces, their visual language appears to draw from the cubist tradition, which approaches subjects from multiple perspectives simultaneously. Her compositions’ soft tones and dynamic spatial juxtapositions echo early modernist experiments by artists like Kandinsky, Braque, Boccioni, and Diebenkorn. These painters explored the fragmentation and reconstruction of space on a flat plane, much like Liu’s method of layering and intersecting visual elements. Her use of color and form creates a sense of depth and movement that transcends traditional representation, allowing for multiple interpretations within a single piece.
In addition, Liu’s work bears the mark of urban landscapes, even if abstracted. Whether it’s a patch of grass sprouting unexpectedly or a pattern reminiscent of wrought iron, her compositions distill the city’s visual motifs into more abstract, painterly forms. These elements are juxtaposed within the four edges of her canvases, creating a tension between representation and abstraction. This method mirrors how memory and perception intersect—how fragments of places and objects are recalled and reassembled in the mind, forming a personal map rather than an objective one.
Ultimately, Liu’s paintings offer a contemplative, nuanced exploration of space, identity, and memory. Through their vibrant, segmented compositions, they prompt viewers to reflect on how cultural and environmental influences shape our perceptions and how mapping can be less about direction and more about experience and interpretation.
Chia-Hsiu Liu, Watercolor 1, 2024, watercolor and gouache on paper, 14” x 10”
The curatorial statement for the exhibition describes Tim Moran’s work as “suffocation embodied,” portraying “constrained bodies, entangled structures, [and] architectures that do not shelter but ensnare.” As the only member of the collective who has already graduated, Moran’s practice has continued to evolve, with his latest works demonstrating a persistent and probing engagement with form and space. His recurring motif of a semi-formless figure, reminiscent of a cloth-draped and spooky ghost from Scooby-Doo, started as “doodles” before emerging as an omnipresent character within his paintings. Moran describes these figures as self-portraits that delineate and differentiate between internal and external spaces. Despite their repeated appearance, Moran insists that his paintings are “more about the situation than they are about the person,” positioning the figure as a vehicle for situational exploration rather than autobiographical representation.
Tim Moran, Hindsight, 2024, acrylic, sumi ink, oil pastel and collage on cold press paper, 28” × 42”
Moran’s work. with it’s use of tape, collage, and other media, has visual links to Tom Sachs’s bricolage practices. Like Sachs, Moran combines disparate elements in ways that challenge the boundaries between fine art and everyday materials, echoing that bricolage ethos. In some of Moran’s work, surfaces that may appear to be screen-printed are made using a more complex resist technique and sections that appear to reveal the wall behind the work are more like a trompe l'oeil representation of negative space. Moran’s layered and often chaotic surfaces also parallel Kurt Schwitters’s use of found materials and fragmentary compositions, while his deliberate erosion and restructuring of ordered forms may reflect something like Arte Povera’s embrace of decay and transformation. The visual repetition of Moran’s ghostly forms, interspersed with rough textures and unexpected juxtapositions, conjures a sense of disintegration—suggesting that ordered structures inevitably erode and rebel against rigidity.
Moran’s visual language is also reminiscent of the layered, decomposed surfaces seen in graffiti, where images and symbols are painted over, decomposed, and built back up. The “situations” of his paintings or “external spaces” thus become maps of tension and conflict, with the ghost-like figure caught between entropy and order. The sense of disorder, coupled with the tactile quality of Moran’s surfaces, reinforces the notion of painting as a dynamic, ever-changing landscape.
Tim Moran, Work Song (cantus mensurabilis), 2024, acrylic, dry pastel, tape and collage on cold press paper, 42” x 60”
Where the Maps Run Out refuses to offer a clear path, instead celebrating the fragmented, the mutable, and the contingent. By disrupting the urge to categorize, the exhibition positions itself as a space of possibility, where identity, space, and form remain unresolved yet perpetually generative. As Baltimore’s artistic landscape continues to evolve, the Flying House Arts Collective exemplifies how emerging artists can challenge both aesthetic and conceptual conventions through communal, process-oriented practice.