Intention not Perfection: Disability Justice and Inclusive Practice in the Arts
This panel brings together artists, educators, youth voices, and institutional leaders to explore how arts organizations can move beyond performative accessibility toward sustained, anti-ableist practice grounded in lived experience. Rooted in the work of Baltimore-based organizations, this session centers disability justice as an essential-not supplemental- framework for programming, exhibitions, and community engagement. Panelists will share real examples from their work across museums, community arts spaces, and youth media programs, highlighting both successful strategies and ongoing challenges.
The conversation will address: How “access” is often treated as an afterthought-and how to shift it to a core value; Building an organizational culture that resists ableism, even within constraints (time, staffing, funding); Collaborating with disabled artists, youth, and consultants as co-creators, not just participants; Rethinking access holistically: language, marketing, physical space, scheduling, hybrid access, captioning, and ASL; Developing new standards of practice that reflect accountability, transparency, and care. Panelists will emphasize the importance of lived experience, highlighting how artists and community members directly impacted by accessibility barriers must be included in planning, decision-making, and evaluation processes. The session will also acknowledge real institutional limitations, such as capacity and funding, while encouraging actionable, incremental change rooted in intention rather than perfection.
Emily Davidson
Emily (Em) Davidson is the Collections Manager & Registrar for the Reginald F. Lewis Museum of Maryland African American History & Culture, where she is responsible for the care of the museum’s artifacts and archives. As part of the larger Inter
pretation, Visitor Experience, and Education (IVEE) department, she works on temporary and permanent exhibits as well as educational programs and events.
Davidson has a B.A. in History from Northwestern University and an M.A in Museum Studies from Johns Hopkins Hopkins University. Davidson started her career in cultural resource stewardship as an archivist in a series of university archives and special collections. Just prior to joining the Lewis, Davidson managed the private collection and archives of financial firm T. Rowe Price while also performing pro bono archival consulting for non-profits and cultural organizations in the Greater Baltimore-Washington area.
Levi Lewis
Levi Lewis is a filmmaker and accessibility consultant based in Baltimore, Maryland. He works as a freelance videographer documenting the Baltimore arts scene. His work has been shown at the Baltimore Museum of Art, Morgan State University, and the Walters Art Museum, and his video “Nothing About Us Without Us” was shown at the Maryland Arts Council’s 2024 Arts Summit. He has worked on accessibility for the Baltimore Museum of Art and Maryland Institute College of Art. He currently works as an associate with Melanie HoodWilson and Associates and volunteers with Baltimore: The City of Accessible Arts.
Simone Sydnor
Baltimore native, Deborah Mason (she/her) is an active member of Baltimore City of Accessible Arts. She is also a 2025 graduate from Maryland Institute College of Art with a Master’s Degree in Curatorial Practice. She has curated and co-curated five shows including the work of artist husband, Pontella Mason. Prior to attending MICA, she was the director at Sankofa Children’s Museum of African Cultures, and program manager at both National Children’s Museum and Port Discovery Children’s Museum. Her museum experiences totaled over 25 years in writing children’s programming. During her tenure at National Children’s Museum she was a contributing author to the book Family Literacy Projects on a Budget, which allowed parents, formal and informal educators to extend the reading experience with art projects and activities.
Deborah’s professional career began as one of the first female carpenters in the state of Maryland, gaining her journeyman’s certificate in 1976. Between carpentry jobs, she apprenticed with her muralist husband on about ten murals. Dance was her initial introduction into the world of art, where she danced with Olufunmilayo African Dance Theatre for ten years.