BALTIMORE.- In conjunction with Artscape, Baltimore’s premier arts festival, the BMA presents a special exhibition of the finalists for The Janet & Walter Sondheim Prize, which is organized by the Baltimore Office of Promotion & The Arts. The six finalists for this year's $25,000 prize are artists Becky Alprin, Melissa Dickenson, Dawn Gavin, Geoff Grace, Maren Hassinger and Molly Springfield. They were selected by an independent panel of jurors including Laura Hoptman, Senior Curator at the New Museum in New York, Mickalene Thomas, a New York-based artist, and Darby English, an art historian specializing in postwar and contemporary American art, cultural studies, art theory and criticism.

The winner will be announced at a special ceremony and reception held at the BMA on Saturday, July 12. This prestigious award is named after the late Baltimore civic leader Walter Sondheim and his late wife, Janet. Sondheim’s enormous impact on Baltimore included overseeing desegregation of the City schools in 1954, and championing the redevelopment of the Inner Harbor in the 1970s. Another exhibition of semifinalists will take place at the Maryland Institute College of Art’s Decker and Meyerhoff Galleries from July 17 through August 2.