BmoreArt

“We are artists and creatives, but where is the big bold visionary thinking?” says Tonya Miller Hall, Baltimore’s Senior Advisor of Art and Culture, who has been working with BOPA Interim CEO Robin Murphy to plan this year’s festival. “Artists have always been forward thinkers, building cities of the future. This is an opportunity to build something for the future. Why shouldn’t we consider models in other cities – like Prospect New Orleans for example – that are effectively transforming a city and creating a national reputation?”

As a publication, BmoreArt has always supported BOPA’s efforts at Artscape, including coverage and reviews of Sondheim exhibits, photo essays of the festival, and highlighting the artists and effort.

However, in its’ one-size-fits-all structure, I have felt personally that the festival as a whole has underperformed given the significant city investment made in it every year. There have been highlights and individual projects that have been excellent, but compared to other arts festivals in other cities, it’s been unfocused and delivered inconsistent results.

After being in regular conversation with many of its key players, including arts districts, curators, BOPA staff, and government officials, I believe that Artscape could achieve much more and as a city, we need to aim higher. For the size of the investment made, Artscape should offer a discernible impact upon the geographical area where it’s hosted and on our regional arts ecosystem.

What I would like to see is this festival fostering sustainable, measurable, lasting impact – on artists, galleries, local businesses, and cultural organizations – as well as to areas of our city that need support. If Artscape is truly an investment in Baltimore, I want to see the fruits of the labor continue to blossom beyond one weekend of the year that often includes thunder-floods and heat that rivals the fires of hell.

One aspect of the new Artscape that appeals to me is that the city is investing festival dollars in murals, lighting, and outdoor furniture that will permanently improve the heavily trafficked Sunday Farmer’s Market area. Another is that the new festival footprint will include walkable access to indoor spaces that will host Sondheim Finalists, Semi-Finalists, and a new art fair curated by Derrick Adams called Scout, designed to encourage collectors to take Baltimore artists seriously.

Will it be a success? I don’t know. The first year is going to be a challenge, but personally, I am thrilled that this year’s Artscape is attempting to do better for the city by making some radical changes. As a festival purportedly designed to celebrate and elevate the arts in Baltimore, Artscape has not been particularly effective. I’m not hating on Artscape. It’s just important to say clearly what it is, and what it has been, in order to consider what it could be. 

With support from Governor William Donald Schaefer, former MICA President Fred Lazarus is credited as the architect for the first Artscape festival hosted in 1982 and the reason it was centered on Mount Royal Avenue, with a subsequent expansion into Station North and Mount Vernon over several decades. The free, outdoor festival grew each year, and was cited as a source of income for tourism and local businesses. 

Over the past twenty years, Artscape has evolved into a massive, arts-adjacent carnival. It’s been popular and inclusive, and for many visitors, their only connection to the art of their place and time. In its heyday, Artscape was the largest free outdoor arts festival in the country. People showed up to shop, eat, hang out, walk around, enjoy outdoor art experiences and free concerts with greats like Aretha Franklin, Ray Charles, and Ethel Ennis.

I remember seeing Chaka Khan and Salt’n’Peppa one year. There was always a sense of nostalgia attached to the national music acts and a sense of family in the crowd. For me, the nighttime concerts were the high point of the festival, but the best visual artists were largely absent. 

In recent years, Artscape has not been able to attract the sponsorships necessary to keep it afloat. Road closures and traffic interfere with local neighborhoods, businesses, arts institutions, and travel to and from Penn Station. No matter what the date, the festival would fall on the three hottest, most humid days of the summer, or include cancelling thunderstorms that are a financial liability for outdoor vendors. 

Artscape attracts a lot of people, and is a boost for tourism, but what percentage of its funding goes to vendors who travel from fair to fair, to national musical acts, and to the national events companies that can put up those Faux Christo orange gates and take them back down? How much of the money invested stays in Baltimore and circulates throughout our ecosystem? How much has a lasting impact on artists and communities?  

I believe that this investment should have a long-term impact–not just on local businesses who happen to be located on the festival footprint, but upon Baltimore’s arts ecosystem as a whole. This means it should improve economic conditions for those who create and manifest culture for us every single day of the year–including artists, artisans, galleries, creative businesses, curators, cultural organizations, nonprofits, and arts institutions, which frankly, all could benefit from strategic investment from Baltimore City. 

Off the festival footprint, one main way that Artscape has made a huge impact on the visual arts and prioritized excellence within Baltimore’s growing arts communities was the establishment of the Sondheim Prize in 2006, with a $25,000 (now $30) purse for the winner and a museum show for all of the finalists. 

The Sondheim exhibit was originally hosted upstairs at the BMA in the Thallheimer galleries, reserved for its most important shows. I would argue that the museum show was more valuable than the purse, since very few local artists were being exhibited in our museums, although the size of the prize created national credibility. After a few years, the exhibit relocated to The Walters, and in both cases, has no physical proximity to the festival itself. 

A large exhibit of Sondheim Semi-Finalists, often hosted at MICA, has long been a favorite part, along with BOPA curated exhibits B-23 and 24, hosted in the past few iterations. In recent years, the Sondheim Semi-Finalists have been exhibited at School 33 in Federal Hill, which is a great space but offers no access to festival-goers. 

This year, I am thrilled that the Sondheim Semi-Finalists will be hosted by The Peale, part of the footprint of this year’s festival. With the Sondheim Finalists at The Walters, the exhibit will finally be walkable from the new downtown location. So at least now the two exhibitions presenting this year’s group of “best regional artists” will be accessible, for the first time ever.

Brand new at Artscape this year is SCOUT, an art fair curated by Derrick Adams, and featuring fifty of Baltimore’s best artists and galleries, hosted inside the War Memorial building across from City Hall. Artscape has attempted an “Artist-Run Art Fair” in past years, but it was hosted in a parking garage. Baltimore has never had a professional art fair, and this one could offer an unprecedented opportunity to experience and collect art that is serious, significant, and museum-worthy in an indoor setting. Collecting work from local artists and galleries is a direct way to invest in our cultural ecosystem in the longer term, where dollars invested circulate and multiply.

In addition to supporting Baltimore’s artists, it’s worth acknowledging that our galleries do much of the heavy lifting when it comes to culture. Our galleries have largely been absent from Artscape, a weakness in the festival for the past few years, although they are encouraged to apply to participate in Scout as well.

Before 2020, Artscape was more intentional about including local galleries, curators, and artists through their Artscape Gallery Network program. This was a city-wide circuit of art galleries, each opening during the festival weekend and exhibiting artists who applied for the Sondheim Prize. So, not only did artists know that their work was being seen by the Sondheim Jurors, but it was seen by every local gallery in town – just from one application! 

The Artscape Gallery Network was sponsored by the festival, with funding, marketing, and printed materials advertising it – and any gallery could apply to participate. This meant that the two weeks surrounding the festival were filled with a series of opening receptions all over the city, many in succession over the same day, and created a sense of visibility and community – for local artists, curators, and galleries, basically, the people who carry the largest burden of cultural production for our city all year round.

It is this emphasis on the working artists in this city, and not an emphasis on a geographic footprint, that I want to see realized with intentionality as Artscape moves into the future. 

Looking at this year’s plans, there are a lot of changes, the main one that the festival is moving downtown to include the footprint of the downtown farmer’s market, Holliday Street, the War Memorial Plaza in front of City Hall, the War Memorial Building, the Peale Museum, the former Ida B’s restaurant, the former Hammerjacks, and Center Stage, with a walkable path to The Walters. There will be two outdoor musical stages, outdoor vendors and site-specific outdoor art projects, but lots of opportunities to experience art and food indoors so that the festival is no longer dependent upon the weather. 

Let’s be honest: great art mostly does not play well with the outdoors, unless specifically designed for it.

Creating walkable opportunities to experience art inside, with the Sondheim Semi-Finalists at The Peale, the new Scout Art Fair in the War Memorial Building, a Day and Night disco at Hammerjacks, a Food Incubator inside two floors of the former Ida B’s restaurant, Kidscape, and Beyond the Reel, exploring Baltimore’s TV and film industries with screenings and panel discussions at Center Stage, with the Sondheim Finalists a walkable distance at The Walters. This all creates a lot of options to experience art, both inside and out, and to raise the quality of the artwork presented.

A group of 80 juried artisan vendors will be located outdoors, but under the I-83 Underpass, site of the downtown farmer’s market, to offer protection from unreliable weather. In addition, the festival will commission local artists to paint murals on the 44 large columns holding up the end of the 83 highway, a lasting improvement to the space used by thousands every Sunday, and they plan to install new lighting and outdoor furniture as well. 

Those who want to walk around Baltimore eating a giant turkey leg may have to get their fix at the Renaissance Festival this year. In addition to food trucks, Artscape is including a curated “Flavor Lab,” a culinary experience featuring some of Baltimore’s best restaurants who have never been included to serve as an anchor. Described as “a festival inside a festival,” visitors will have a chance to sample and enjoy Baltimore’s culinary artistry.

For music lovers, the two main stages are located on higher ground than in past years, guaranteeing that concerts will not be cancelled due to flooding. And inside the former Hammerjacks venue, there will be Dj’s and a disco, house music for day and  nighttime dance parties. And then Kidscape and the main festival will happen in front of City Hall, with parking available at Mercy and a few other adjacent lots.

This year’s music artists were also announced, to a mix of nods and head scratches. Singer and Golden Globe nominee Fantasia headlining on Saturday and “Masked Singer” judge Robin Thicke is headlining on Sunday. “Oops (Oh My)” R&B singer Tweet, North Carolina rap duo Little Brother and country singer Tanner Adell will also perform. The main stage will be located at the War Memorial Plaza, with a second stage around the corner. Personally, I would like to see Baltimore-based or affiliated musical acts featured, but perhaps this is goal to consider for subsequent years.

For the past forty years, Artscape has been a uniquely Baltimore creation, a collision of art, culture, community, and carnival. It’s been a beloved – and also hated – tradition, but it has only been effective in parts, not as a whole. I would like for this festival to function more successfully for the artists and audiences based in Baltimore, and if this means it’s relocated into an area that doesn’t have competing traffic from schools, businesses, and institutions, and helps to reanimate a struggling downtown area, I’m all for it.

If we imagine Artscape not as a nostalgic heat-soaked arts carnival, and instead a tool for city transformation, what does that look like? I don’t think this question will be answered in just one year, but Baltimore is an amazing city, offering great cultural experiences that include art, food, and performance. If we can organize an arts festival that can support these creative industries, all the better. 

Artscape Deadlines Approach

• Immersive Mural Arts Project – A large-scale, immersive mural experience under the JFX.
• Scout: Making Contemporary Art Accessible – An art fair dedicated to showcasing both emerging and established artists. Applications are available for artists and for galleries / art dealers. 
• Echoes of the City: Local Talent Stage – A platform to highlight Baltimore-based musicians and performers.

Additional Opportunities: 
Creative Marketplace Application
The Flavor Lab Application
Community Impact Zone at Artscape Application (non-profits)
Echoes of the City Application (Local Emerging Artist Stage)
Pop Up Performer Application
Kidscape Nonprofit Table Activity Vendor Application
Kidscape Mural Wall (Call for Teaching Artists)
Youth Artist Market Vendor Applications