Losing Winter, a new exhibition opening in mid-July at the Maryland Center for History and Culture (MCHC) in Baltimore, examines changes in winter weather patterns through photographs, video, and personal memory.

The brainchild of Lynn Cazabon, professor of art and director of CIRCA, and co-curated for MCHC by UMBC history alumnus Joe Tropea ’06, history and M.A. ’08, historical studies, the exhibit includes images as varied as a news report by a young Oprah Winfrey, “Snowmageddon” in 2010, icy conditions during the Great Fire of Baltimore in 1904, and the 1899 blizzard.

Although the exhibition doesn’t directly address climate change, it’s certainly a subtext, said Cazabon, whose interdisciplinary work has often centered on the intersection of environmental and social issues. 

“Things are changing,” she said. “What are we doing about it?”

Winter Memories

Losing Winter was sparked by Cazabon’s own memory of freezing as she ice skated at age 14 in Michigan where she grew up. “That lake, in fact, doesn’t reliably freeze anymore,” she added. The idea percolated further in 2014 while Cazabon was making a film about women who had moved to the Yukon.

Talking about the weather used to be the quintessential conversation starter, she noted. “Now it’s fraught with emotion and worry. The weather is not an innocent topic anymore.”

“It forces us to think about the possibility of climate change. Why is our climate changing?” said Tropea, curator of films and photographs at MCHC.

The MCHC show features Maryland memories while a concurrent mounting of the exhibition at VisArts in Rockville will pair recorded reminiscences by area senior citizens with children’s artwork inspired by those memories. The VisArts exhibition opens in May.

At MCHC, home movies and weather reports from the 1970s, ‘80s and ‘90s will be on display, including a report from Oprah Winfrey, then on the WJZ news staff, interviewing ice skaters at the old Memorial Stadium.

“It’s an experience that takes you through the decades,” Tropea said.

Cazabon said she discovered “little moments of joy” along the way, such as a woman in her 80s recalling street skating in her boots, Baltimore Sun photographer A. Aubrey Bodine’s historic photos of Groundhog Day ceremonies, and old weather forecasts.

One of Tropea’s favorite pieces is 1928 industrial footage taken at the Holtwood Dam over the Susquehanna River. Ice floes rushing toward the bay caused extensive damage near the shoreline before the dam was built, Tropea said. The film, which will be projected on a large wall, depicts ice floes going over the dam and breaking apart as they fall. 

“Just watching it makes me feel cold,” Tropea said.

For the MCHC show, Cazabon and Tropea delved into the archives at MCHC as well as in the Special Collections Department of the Albin O. Kuhn Library with the help of Lindsey Loeper ’04, American studies, reference and instruction archivist.

Since Covid-19 restrictions have closed the library to researchers, Loeper collected 35 photos to show the professor and Tropea via video conferencing. 

“There were things I’ve never seen before,” she said, noting that the collection has millions of pieces. Among the items she shared were glass negatives and works by well-known photographers such as Marion E. Warren. The oldest photo featured children throwing snowballs in 1914.

Evolving Exhibit

Cazabon mounted her original Losing Winter exhibition at the National Museum of Contemporary Art in Bucharest, Romania, in 2018. It featured audio memories of past Romanian winters, along with melting ice sculptures by a local artist.

As part of the Losing Winter experience, Cazabon is also working with UMBC’s Imaging Research Center on an augmented reality app to display and allow people to experience the winter memories of others. Cazabon received a 2020-21 Saul Zaentz Innovation Fund grant to produce the app. The exhibition at MCHC will include a display of the app playing memories collected from people in Maryland. Cazabon has been working with MCHC Community Engagement Manager Martha Oster-Beal to host virtual workshops during which memories are shared and recorded.

The yearlong exhibition will be housed on the second floor of MCHC, in gallery space across from the H. Furlong Baldwin Library. Visiting at the hottest time of year, when the exhibit launches, “you might be dreaming of winter,” Cazabon said.

Cazabon said the project keeps evolving. The modular format of her project also makes it adaptable. She invites members of the UMBC community to contact her to participate. She’s open to a variety of memories and opinions. 

“The project is designed to evolve with each new site,” she said, adding, “I would like it to be a collection that includes people from around the world.”

— Mary K. Tilghman ’79

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MCHC will host participatory virtual workshops for residents to record their memories on April 29 and May 27. Go towww.mdhistory.org/events for details and registration.

For more information on how to participate in the project, visit https://www.losingwinter.net.

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Header image: Blizzard of 1922, Saturday afternoon. Unidentified photographer, January 28, 1922. Photo print, 10.25 x 13.5 inches. Municipal Museum Collection. Maryland Center for History and Culture, MC1909.

“My Fulbright experience changed the course of my life and my career,” remembers Eugene C. Schaffer, professor of education.

Early in his career, Shaffer earned a Fulbright Scholar award to bring his knowledge of curriculum development and teaching practices to a collaboration with Taiwanese educators for two years. “There is always so much to learn and understand about history and how different cultures work together to hope for peace,” he says. “My work in Taiwan helped me to see the need for sharing research on innovative and effective curriculum practices globally.” Shaffer went on to travel the world and lived and worked with educators in the UK and Japan. Recently, he earned another Fulbright to work with educators in Kosovo. “The most salient takeaway of my Fulbright experiences is how much the cultures and the people gave to me. I am a better teacher and a better person for trying to understand another cultural form,” shares Shaffer.

UMBC’s College of Arts, Humanities, and Social Sciences (CAHSS) is working to connect more faculty with Fulbright opportunities, particularly given CAHSS faculty’s long and successful history of transformative international research and teaching. UMBC faculty have already completed Fulbrights on every continent except Antarctica, and there’s great interest in expanding their international work even further.

“We have had tremendous success with the Fulbright U.S. Student Program,” says Brian Souders, Ph.D. ’09, language literacy, and culture, and Fulbright Program advisor. “We hope that by promoting this opportunity with CAHSS faculty, we can encourage similar success with faculty awards.”

UMBC’s Office of International Education; Center for Social Science Scholarship; Center for Innovation, Research and Creativity in the Arts (CIRCA); and Dresher Center for the Humanities are partnering with the Council of the International Exchange of Scholars (which sponsors the Fulbright Scholar Programs) to host the first CAHSS Fulbright Accelerator. All CAHSS faculty are invited to attend the session on Monday, November 5, at noon, in Performing Arts and Humanities Building room 216.

Through the Fulbright Accelerator, faculty will learn more about semester- and year-long fellowships, short-term research stays, teaching visits, and postdoctoral scholarships the Fulbright Program offers. Along with Schaffer, former CAHSS Fulbright Scholars across the arts, the humanities, and the social sciences will share their experiences.

Charissa Cheah, professor of psychology, just returned from her Fulbright experience in Italy this summer and will present at the Fulbright Accelerator. She worked with groups of Tunisian Muslim adolescents to try to understand how they and their families adapted to Italian culture. “The more I immersed myself in the community,” says Cheah, “the more questions I had about how these adolescents navigate their intersecting religious, ethnic, and national identities across family, school, community, particularly with the current socio-political climate in Italy.” She hopes these insights will help her gain some comparative insights with her work with Muslim adolescents in Maryland.

John Stolle-McAllister, associate dean of CAHSS, will share his experience as a Fulbright Scholar in Ecuador researching indigenous identity. “I was able to bring my wife, my son, and daughter. By the end of our year we all were more fluent and part of the local community,” remembers Stolle-McAllister.

“The most profound part of my Fulbright experience was being open to letting go of assumptions and go deeper into my research in a way I could not have done at home,” Stolle-Mcallister says. “What I found were more complex questions and layered answers that helped me to gain a broader perspective.”

Tim Nohe, professor of visual arts and director of CIRCA, will represent the visual arts Fulbright experience along with Eric Dyer, associate professor of animation and interactive media who will share his scholarship in Denmark. Nohe’s work engages with traditional and electronic media in public spaces and in daily life, and he has worked in close collaboration with artist colleagues in Australia. In one video produced in collaboration with composer Warren Burt and broadcast across Australia by the ABC Classic network, Nohe worked under the iconic Sydney Harbor Bridge:

Through international work, says Nohe, “Scholars transform their teaching and scope of experience and share that with UMBC faculty and students. The perspective and broad scope of references is truly invaluable, and we as scholars serve as ambassadors for our institutions abroad.”

Featured image: International flags in the UMBC Commons. Photo by Marlayna Demond ’11 for UMBC.

Samuel “Sam” Winnie
B.A., Music Composition
Summa Cum Laude
Hometown: Joppa, Maryland
Plans: Graduate studies in music composition at the Hogeschool voor de Kunsten Utrecht

UMBC has provided countless opportunities for me to travel, learn, collaborate, and develop my craft.

Sam Winnie is a trombonist, bass player, and composer—a multi-talented musician who has collaborated with dancers, filmmakers, and game developers. His work has been recognized by fellow musicians in his field. Most recently, the jury of the National Student Electronic Music Event accepted a piece of his for performance at the University of Oklahoma.

Winnie is Linehan Artist Scholar, recipient of the UMBC Achievement Award, and member of Phi Kappa Phi Honors Society and the National Society of Collegiate Scholars.

For his study abroad experience he attended the Conservatorio G. Nicolini in Piacenza, Italy. Since then he has worked in UMBC’s Study Abroad office, assisting other students in developing their plans for enriching study abroad experiences. Winnie will return to Europe for graduate studies in music composition at the Hogeschool voor de Kunsten Utrecht in the Netherlands this fall.

Images: Sam Winnie and cellist Chanel Whitehead at the University of Oklahoma, performing a work for solo cello and live electronics for the National Student Electronic Music Event; photo courtesy Sam Winnie. Portrait by Marlayna Demond ’11 for UMBC.