Baltimore’s Artscape festival will return as a five-day event on Sept. 20 to 24, 2023, focusing less on food and more on “the arts.”
Much of the festival will take place in the Station North Arts and Entertainment District, where organizers promise to use Artscape “as a creative placemaking vessel to transform vacant lots…into thriving creative marketplaces and sustainable civic gathering spaces.” A stretch of Mount Royal Avenue near the Maryland Institute College of Art campus – part of the festival’s historical boundaries – also will be part of the footprint.
On Sept. 20, the sole event will be an “opening night gala” to kick off Artscape. It will be followed by four days of the main festival, including art exhibitions, interactive exhibits and pop-up performances, roughly from noon to 10 p.m. each day.
A new element will be an “art exhibition pavilion” featuring “leading contemporary visual artists from around the world, including Baltimore based artists.” Derrick Adams, a Baltimore-born artist and entrepreneur, will be the guest curator for the pavilion, part of an effort to elevate the festival by showcasing “world-class” artists. Now based in New York, Adams, 55, founded the Last Resort Artist Retreat in Waverly.
The Baltimore Symphony Orchestra, which performed during the first Artscape 40 years ago, will have a free concert on the final day. The concert will coincide with the arrival of Jonathan Heyward as the symphony’s new conductor and the first person of color to serve as the orchestra’s music director in its 106-year history.
The Baltimore Office of Promotion and the Arts (BOPA), which produces Artscape, on Thursday posted the 2023 dates, a preliminary site plan and other details on a revamped website, Artscape.org, that encourages artists, performers, vendors and potential sponsors to sign up and find out how they can participate.
Mayor Brandon Scott and BOPA CEO Donna Drew Sawyer held a news conference at the SNF Parkway Theatre to discuss plans for the event, which will be first time an in-person Artscape festival has been held in Baltimore since 2019, before the COVID-19 pandemic. A virtual festival was held in 2020.
“After three very long years, I’m pleased to announce that Artscape will be back for 2023,” Scott said. “I made a promise that Artscape would return, and today we’re fulfilling that promise.”
Scott referred to the 2023 version as “Artscape 2.0” because it will change so much from previous iterations.
“We’re not just returning, but [coming] back bigger and better and more different than ever,” he said. “We’re expanding our footprint and deepening our relationship with the arts…And no, it’s not going to conflict with any holidays.”
“BOPA aims to continue the Artscape tradition of using the wealth of creative talent to showcase our diversity, boldness and innovation, and to have a positive economic impact for Baltimore artists and communities while adding lasting beauty to our public spaces,” Sawyer said.
A shift to September
The five-day schedule, expanded from three days in previous years, represents a shift away from the mid-July dates when Artscape has taken place in the past. It puts Artscape one week later than the dates that were floated last month — Sept. 13-17, 2023 — but then retracted because they would have conflicted with the Rosh Hashanah holiday.
The new dates fall within the 10 Days of Awe on the Jewish calendar for 2023, the period between Rosh Hashanah and Yom Kippur. The festival’s last day coincides with the start of Yom Kippur, which will begin at sundown on Sept. 24 and end the next day.
Scott said he was aware of the overlap with Yom Kippur, considered the holiest day of the Jewish year, the “Sabbath of Sabbaths,” a time when Jews ask God for forgiveness for their sins to secure their fate. He said one of the reasons Artscape was expanded from three days to five was to give people who can’t go to Artscape on Yom Kippur more chances to go another day. He said he wants Artscape to be “open to all communities.”
Mark Hanson, president and CEO of the symphony, said the concert will be at 3 p.m. on Sept. 24, putting it before sundown. He said he didn’t yet know if the concert will be inside the Joseph Meyerhoff Symphony Hall or somewhere nearby.
‘Singular focus on the arts’
Started in 1982, Artscape grew into one of the largest free arts festivals in the country, drawing an estimated 350,000 visitors over three days.
“Artscape is Back!” the website announced Thursday. “We envision a bold, ambitious festival with a singular focus on the arts – an Artscape that is more accessible to everyone and brings a lasting impact to communities in our city.”
The website, which went live early this morning but has been on and off since then, outlines some of the events and features of the “renewed” festival that visitors will see. They include:
Live Performances: The website says Artscape will have a “Main Stage entertainment hub featuring a mash up of national acts for music and culture lovers.”
Artist Talkbacks: “This conversation series will bring together artists, doers, makers, authors, musicians and individuals who dream big,” the website says.
Family and Youth Immersive Experience: “Bound to be the premiere gathering place for families, youth and children. A multiverse of attractions and events will surely await.”
Artist Marketplace: “Art, fashion, food and trinkets for every style. From minimal to eclectic. Here you find something for the everyday enthusiast.”
Other features of Artscape include: a film festival, a music and beer garden, “culinary delights,” and Artscape After Dark.
As presented on the Artscape website, the footprint includes Mount Royal Avenue between Charles Street and North Avenue, and land around the Mount Royal train station, part of MICA’s campus. That area has been part of previous Artscape festivals.
For 2023, the boundaries have been expanded to includes part of the Station North Arts and Entertainment District. The Station North portion is bounded roughly by the Jones Falls Expressway on the south, Howard Street on the west, 20th Street on the north and Saint Paul Street on the east, with additional activities in Greenmount West around the Area 405 arts hub at 405 E. Oliver St.
The district includes properties on both sides of Charles Street between Penn Station and 20th Street and on both sides of North Avenue between Howard and St. Paul streets. The Parkway Theatre and the Charles Theatre are within the boundaries, as is MICA’s Fred Lazarus IV Center at 131 W. North Ave.
The “historical footprint” portion of the layout comes close to the campus of the University of Baltimore, which will be in session during the event. Administrators there have expressed concerns about not wanting a large festival in September to make it difficult for students, faculty and others to get to campus.
But university spokesperson Chris Hart said UB is looking forward to Artscape’s return.
“The University of Baltimore welcomes a rejuvenated Artscape for 2023,” Hart said in a statement. “It’s a return to those lively days and nights when artists and entertainers captivated the entire city. We look forward to being good neighbors with and strong supporters of this quintessential Baltimore event.”
BOPA’s website cautions that its site plan is preliminary. “The event concepts and ideas on this site are subject to change at the event organizer’s discretion,” it states. “Renderings are a design concept and may not represent the final version or location.”
Sawyer reiterated that point, noting locations for events such as the opening night gala and the art exhibition pavilion are still being determined.
At the press event, BOPA also unveiled a three-minute 20-second video, entitled “What is Art?” and narrated by Baltimore native Andre De Shields, that promotes the 2023 festival by featuring “the next class of great creatives in Baltimore.”
Artists in the video include: vocalist Eze Jackson; muralist Jaz Erenberg; collage artist Bria Sterling Wilson; designer Akio Evans; mixologist Kim Vo; influencer “Chyno”/ The Boy with the Blue Beard (aka Baltimore Foodie); choreographer Brinae Ali; influencer “Bowtie Bob” Nelson; trumpeter Brandon Woody and artist and curator Derrick Adams.
Ellen Janes, executive director of the Central Baltimore Partnership, said she was delighted to see Artscape expanding into Station North and Greenmount West, areas that her organization works to revitalize. She noted that the intersection of Charles Street and North Avenue has been called ‘the crossroads’ of the city and ‘the heart’ of the city.
“To bring the city’s most premiere festival here is so important,” she said. “It’s so heartwarming. And I think, together, we’re going to make it something really extraordinary.”
Scott said he had confidence in BOPA’s ability to produce the Artscape festival and in Baltimore’s ability to support it after the COVID-19 hiatus. He pointed to the success this year of the AFRAM festival in Druid Hill Park and the Charm City Live Festival in War Memorial Plaza.
“We know that they can put on Artscape. They’ve done it for many years,” he said of BOPA. “This will be bigger and it will be better and it will be successful.”
