KANSAS CITY, MO, NOVEMBER 20, 2023: Charlotte Street is seeking submissions from local artists who want their work considered for the 2024-2025 Crossroads Artboards. In partnership with the Crossroads Community Association, the Artboards is an ongoing public art initiative that showcases local contemporary art on an exterior, double-sided billboard at 125 Southwest Boulevard. From April 2024 through March 2025, new, commissioned images by Kansas City area artists will be presented and rotated approximately every three months. Applications are due Monday, January 8, 2024.
Since 2008, the Crossroads Artboards has featured over 100 commissioned works by Kansas City-area artists. The Artboards capture the creative spirit of the Crossroads neighborhood while serving as an alternative platform for contemporary art. In addition to being a unique public art opportunity, Charlotte Street’s Executive/Artistic Director Amy Kligman writes,
The Artboards have generated dialogue, surprise, and joy in the Crossroads for 15 years, giving artists prominent public space in the heart of the Crossroads as a platform to share their work and ideas. It’s important to the character of the Crossroads for artists’ voices to be front and center in the community: asking questions, challenging expectations, and driving our inventive spirit.
From politically-engaged art to newly creative platforms for artists and designers alike, the Artboards have served as a site of intrigue and public dialogue over its 15-year history.
Past selections such as Albergue Tijuana-San Diego No. 1 by Israel Garcia Garcia (2021) depicts individuals and families living in temporary encampments alongside the US-Mexico border, telling the story of “elders, peers, and communities during their deadly migrant journey.” In Blind Spot, artist Desiree Morales (2019) beckons the question, “What is the role of the institution,” foreshadowing the Black Lives Matter movement in the summer of 2020 and the unprecedented global impact of the COVID-19 pandemic.
For artists interested in applying to the 2024-2025 Crossroads Artboards, the experience of driving down Southwest Boulevard and seeing your artwork on large-scale billboards is unlike any other. In the past year, 8 artists out of 82 applicants were selected for the Artboards. 2023 Artboards recipient Michelle Chan writes,
The Artboards was an amazing opportunity to share and express both my major American and Chinese cultural influences. These boards are an expression of honoring and opening up to my upbringing and synthesizing something new from them.
Applications open on Monday, November 20, 2023 on Submittable. The deadline to submit is Monday, January 8, 2024 at 11:59 PM (CST). For more information about the Crossroad Artboards and for a complete listing of past recipients, visit charlottestreet.org/crossroads-artboards/.
ABOUT CROSSROAD ARTBOARDS
Since 2008, the Crossroads Artboards has featured over 100 commissioned works by Kansas City-area artists. In partnership with the Crossroads Community Association, the Artboards capture the creative spirit of the Crossroads neighborhood while serving as an alternative platform for contemporary art.
ABOUT CHARLOTTE STREET
Charlotte Street centers Kansas City’s most forward-thinking visual artists, writers, and performers—acting as the primary incubator, provocateur, and connector for the region’s contemporary arts community, and its leading advocate on the national stage. Since 1997, Charlotte Street has distributed over $2 million in awards and grants to artists and their innovative projects, and connected individual artists to each other and to the greater Kansas City community. For more information about Charlotte Street, its awards, programs, and initiatives, visit www.charlottestreet.org.
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View the Press Release as a PDF here.
