ArtPop Street Gallery, a 501c3 organization that gives artists and communities across the region greater access to art and art opportunities, has announced its Cities Program Class of 2023 artists, the tenth Cities Program class in Charlotte.
The 20 artists, which include 19 adults and one senior high school student, will receive upwards of $7 million in outdoor advertising space for one year.
The 20 incoming juried artists come from Mecklenburg, Union, Catawba, Lincoln, Gaston, and York counties. Two of the artists — Arthur Rogers Jr. (2018) and Leigh B. Williams (2014) — are returning ArtPop artists.
The high school senior is Haley Horner of Fort Mill High School. She will receive the same benefits as the adult artists plus a $1,500 scholarship to pursue an arts degree in college.
The class of 2023 artists’ artwork covers a wide range of mediums and subject matters, which can be viewed below. The artwork will be displayed on billboards that span across the Charlotte region’s highways, digital signs in retail developments, newsstands in Uptown Charlotte, digital displays at the Charlotte Douglas International Airport and — new for 2023 — LYNX Blue Line station kings.
Their artwork will be installed beginning in early January on the spaces provided by Adams Outdoor Advertising, Awedience Media, Lamar Advertising and other media partners.
“We are thrilled to welcome another incredibly talented class into the #ArtPopCLT program,” said Wendy Hickey, founder and executive director of ArtPop Street Gallery, in a release announcing the new class on Dec. 2. “In our tenth year of our nonprofit mission we trust the 20 artists featured are able to grow their small business and have their best year ever. Our community will have access to art 365 days a year.”
Hickey pointed out that 2022 Cities Program artists saw 500 million media impressions for their work.
“In 2022, our Cities Program artists’ imprint reached nearly 500 million media impressions. Just imagine how all that art has helped beautify our community and made Charlotte such a unique place to live,” said Brooke Gibbons, director of impact and sustainability at ArtPop.
Launched in Charlotte by Hickey in 2014, ArtPop turns interstate highways and other thoroughfares and public spaces into outdoor art galleries. After nearly being forced to shut down at the onset of the pandemic, ArtPop has fought its way back, more than doubling its advertising space since that time.
Since its founding, ArtPop Street Gallery’s Charlotte program has promoted more than 180 artists on millions of dollars of advertising space.
Below are each of the artworks from ArtPop Cities Program Class of 2023. We’ve included links to where you can see more of each artist’s work as well as the title and medium used for the piece.
This work by Queen City Nerve is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International License.
