Baltimore’s Charles Street corridor is getting a little brighter, thanks to Artscape 2023.
As part of their preparations for the arts festival and its expansion this year into the Station North Arts and Entertainment District, organizers have planned a series of murals, sculpture and other “art installations” that are designed to transform some of the dreary blocks and empty lots that form a sort of No Man’s Land between Mount Vernon and Charles Village.
The public art program is an initiative of the Baltimore Office of Promotion and the Arts (BOPA), the non-profit organization paid to produce the festival, and the Mayor’s Office in City Hall. The idea is to use the energy of the three-day arts festival to create some physical improvements that will last long after the event is over.
The changes will become more apparent between now and Artscape, Sept. 22 to 24. One of the first projects to take shape is “Portals and Passageways,” a large, multi-plane mural that local artist Jaz Erenberg and her crew are painting at the southeast corner of Charles and 20th streets, where K & J Auto Service is located.
Erenberg is using the exterior walls of the former gas station to create a colorful work of art that not only covers the graffiti that was previously there but also tells a story about the city and what she sees as its potential as a hub for creativity. She’s also painting the canopy over the area where the gas pumps used to be.
Across Charles Street, artist Adam Stab is creating a mural that will frame a vacant lot that is turning into a gathering space for the festival, called the North of North Lot. The two projects will bracket one of the main stages for Artscape musicians, at Charles and 20th streets. Additional artists creating murals and other works of public art for Station North are Derrick Adams; Erin Douglas; Maya Hayuk; Saba Hamidi and Scott Pennington.
Boosting the creative economy
Tonya R. Miller-Hall, former chief marketing officer for BOPA, led the push to expand Artscape’s footprint beyond the traditional boundaries of the Mount Royal cultural district and into Station North, which is north of Pennsylvania Station and North Avenue. She also led preliminary planning for the public art program last year, when Mayor Brandon Scott announced that Artscape was returning after a three-year hiatus linked to the COVID-19 pandemic.
Since moving to City Hall in January as Scott’s Senior Advisor for Art and Culture, Miller Hall has made sure her vision became reality. She was walking around various art installation sites on Thursday, surveying the progress.
“It’s incredible how something as simple as a mural or sculpture can completely change an environment,” she said. “This year’s Artscape event has been a wonderful opportunity to showcase Baltimore’s talented artists and boost the city’s creative economy.”
Miller Hall, co-director of Artscape along with BOPA interim CEO Todd Yuhanick, has been an apostle for the idea of using public art to help build “a thriving creative economy” in Baltimore.
She said in a panel discussion this week that Artscape is a prime example of the way artists make an economic contribution to Baltimore. She pushed for Artscape to expand to the Station North arts district, she said, because she wanted to capitalize on the artistic creativity there.
With the expanded footprint, this year’s organizers have been “really intentional about putting artists to work and having some economic impact and creating some sustainable places…that the community can love after the festival is over.”
While Artscape will continue to be a draw in itself, now the goal is to have an impact that lasts well beyond the three days of the event, she said.
“How do you use the festival as a vehicle to create bigger opportunities?” she said. “That’s what we’ve been working on…That’s the social impact. That’s how I want to touch people. Because art has a way of transforming spaces, the hearts and minds of communities. The people on the other side of North Avenue deserve nice things as well.”
A meditation on Baltimore
In the Mount Royal cultural district, anchored by the Meyerhoff Symphony Hall and Lyric Baltimore, there aren’t as many vacant lots and abandoned buildings covered with graffiti as in Station North. Private property owners, and planners on campuses such as the University of Baltimore and the Maryland Institute College of Art, are less inclined to allow muralists to modify the buildings and public spaces they control.
Station North, by contrast, has a history of welcoming murals on buildings to combat blight. Property owners such as Jong Kim, longtime owner of K & J Auto Service, have embraced the latest effort, granting permission for the murals.
Even Washington D. C. restaurateur and real estate investor Tony Cheng is allowing a mural on the billboard that sits atop the former bank building he owns at the northeast corner of North Avenue and Charles Street, Miller Hall said. The front of The Crown, a nightspot at 1910 N. Charles Street, is getting one, too.
Erenberg is leading a team of four artists to complete the mural on Kim’s property. Other members of her crew include Saba Hamidi, who heads Made by Saba; Kait Klusewitz, who heads Kait K Designs; and Blue Robin, head of Blue Robin Designs.
They started several weeks ago by priming the walls to cover graffiti that was visible before. Then they began creating their mural with latex paint that’s guaranteed to last at least five years, using cherry pickers where necessary. The mural contains a series of geometrical forms, which double as hidden symbols that tell a story. Colors include yellow, orange, blue, turquoise, purple and magenta.
What does it mean? Erenberg said “Portals and Passageways” is intended to be “a journey to be taking a collective breath to meditate on the good things in Baltimore.”
She said the mural is meant to be approached from North Avenue, the way drivers on one-way Charles Street will see it, and serves as a gateway to “a sort of magical consciousness-land that I want you to be in.”
In the mural, she said, “there are archways that represent portals and there are lots of staircases” that symbolize “choices that you’ve made, how you got to where you are, and how Baltimore got to where it is.”
In addition to the different shapes, the vibrant colors are meant to attract attention, she said. “Everybody’s really drawn to the color.”
In the center of it all is the former gas station canopy, which is going to become a “psychedelic sky” under which people can contemplate the journeys that they’re on and that the city is on – and maybe change the way they think about Baltimore.
“It’s all just to invite people to meditate on what makes Baltimore what it is, focusing on the positive – the talent, the art, the creativity, the people, the community that is Baltimore,” she said.
Taking notice
People are noticing, said Kim, who has owned K & J Auto Service for 30 years.
“It’s good. I like it,” he said. “This area is too dark…This makes it bright.”
Now, “people come over here,” he said. “They enjoy…Everybody likes it, the color…People come over and feel better here.”
Ezra Love, a resident of the J. Van Story Branch apartments for seniors a block away at 11 W. 20th St., came over to watch the artists work.
“It’s beautiful,” he said. “This area was messed up with graffiti, all around here. Now it looks a lot better.”
Love described himself as a color freak: “I wish I could paint my apartment like this,” he said.
