Pavilion Designers Camp North End developer ATCO Properties & Management held a competition in 2020, calling for submissions from emerging Black architects. The challenge: design exterior façades for Keswick Platform, an upcoming retail corridor along Keswick Avenue. The winners would conceptualize four of the pavilions inside the area. Spurred partly by conversations surrounding equity in design, ATCO’s new competition was …
Neka King & Georgie Nakima At Camp North End, a parking structure isn’t just a parking structure. It’s a six-level, wraparound canvas for two of the Southeast’s premier muralists: Charlotte’s Georgie Nakima and Atlanta’s Neka King. The two were tapped to transform this massive edifice set to open in the winter of 2022. Having never collaborated, the pair kickstarted …
A walk around Camp North End is known to spark creativity, but no piece on the property embodies that goal like Abel R. Jackson III’s. The Talking Walls mural festival debuted in 2018 as a citywide, artist-run effort, showcasing both international and local talent. Jackson was asked to join the roster in 2021 and took the opportunity to create his …
Verizon’s “A Call for Kindness” is a campaign intended to “dial up kindness across the country.” Murals in metros around the U.S. are part of that effort, with Charlotte’s residing on The Mount in Camp North End. Garrison Gist, whose work is infused with the pop culture iconography and flair of the ’90s, is behind our city’s piece of the …
You’ve certainly seen Arko’s work across the site already, from Boileryard doors to a former guardhouse. The Charlotte native revels in the variety of objects he’s been able to paint at Camp North End: “From clean steel, old wood, to rusted equipment parts,” he says, “Camp’s variety of surfaces and objects to work with give me a chance to test …
At the beginning of 2021, a new law required hospitals to provide clear pricing to patients. The nonprofit Power to the Patients teamed up with artist and activist Shepard Fairey to spread the word about the law and push for further clarity—particularly vital during the emergence of COVID-19. Fairey, founder of OBEY Clothing, emerged from the late-1980s skateboarding scene, and …
The following excerpt is courtesy of WCNC’s article and video March 30, 2021 marked Vincent Van Gogh’s birthday, and to celebrate it, one Charlotte artist painted a mural in his honor. Specifically, Bree Stallings painted 168 sunflowers to celebrate the 168 years that have passed since Van Gogh was born. Stallings said she had just joined the Blumenthal team as …
Blumenthal Performing Arts began “We Are Hip-Hop,” an ongoing celebration of local music and culture, in 2020. The project’s organizers come from varying disciplines: Boris “Bluz” Rogers is an Emmy-winning spoken-word poet; A.J. Glasco is a dancer and choreographer; Greg Jackson stokes community dialogue and guides youths with the nonprofit Heal Charlotte; and Bree Stallings is a visual artist, muralist, …
Tamara LaValla describes the experience of designing the first Hygge Coworking space in Charlotte’s Third Ward as “a beautiful creative trustfall.” LaValla, of Batch Craft, is a multidisciplinary artist whose graphic design skills had never been applied to interior (or exterior) design. Still, in 2015, LaValla and the team were able to alter that first Hill Street space to embody …
Darion Fleming at Babe & Butcher Darion Fleming’s massive murals, which blend startling realism with stylized, two-dimensional forms, appear all over the Charlotte area. His piece at the front of Babe & Butcher stuns on a smaller scale, with its emerging floral forms. Charcuterie shop Babe & Butcher opened at the site in 2021, and like many of the businesses …
Dammit Wesley’s “Strange Fruit” murals appear across the Charlotte area, and as of this writing, his piece near MacFly Fresh Printing Co. and Pine Gate Renewables is the latest in the series. The artist mixes and remixes imagery derived from vintage pop culture, historical portraiture, and racially charged iconography. Much of this series, in particular, shows us how many of …
Brittani George, who works under the name “Georgie Nakima,” took an atypical path to a career in art. The Winston-Salem State University graduate spent her academic life in the sciences, with a major in biology and a minor in chemistry. Her career has been spent in both research in those areas and in parallel, as an artist, bringing the lessons …
Arko83 visited Camp North End to watch his creative (and personal) partner, Owl, craft her Boileryard mural, and “a particularly dilapidated door” caught his eye. It had gone unused, too rotted to be considered for the site’s mural commissions. The pull of the languishing door became too strong for the Charlotte native, so he took it upon himself to use …
Colombia native Nico Amortegui has crafted a distinctive style, infused with his encounters with varying cultures and his own family of designers, photographers, architects, and artists. He immigrated to the U.S. in the 1990s, and eventually, found a home in Charlotte with his family. Today, he’s one of the most sought-after muralists in the region. His work here reflects his …
Marcus Kiser has no shortage of outlets for his art: comic book projects, product design, illustration, editorial magazine covers, and the ongoing, multi-genre affair “Intergalactic Soul” with collaborator Jason Woodberry. His work has been called “magical realist,” “Afrofuturist,” and for him personally, “an artist without limits.” His bay door is a prime example for his knack for subtlety. In the …
Patch Whisky grew up immersed in pop culture. He credits classic American cartoons, Japanese video games from the 1980s, and a love for cryptozoology as the inspiration for his signature creatures, adorning and writhing on walls across the globe. He says he feels that his creations belong in “that realm with Bigfoot and the Loch Ness Monster.” His prominent mural …
Catalina Duarte is known for her distinctive, amorphous designs, found on brewery and gallery walls, apparel, and even live models. She began this path at Central Piedmont Community College in Charlotte, when a professor encouraged her to experiment with lines and mark-making. “After destroying yards of mixed-media paper, I stumbled into a language that I didn’t fully understood but could …
Self-taught painter Ryan Cheuvront has a practice split between ethereal abstract art with a “psychedelic symmetry” and lighthearted, creature-driven scenes that recall the work of Keith Haring or Kenny Scharf. His mural on the site takes the latter approach, with a collection of monsters occupying a Boileryard entrance. It stands out as a piece devoid of color, but packed with …
A few doors down is the door by Tucker Sward. An emerging talent and UNC Charlotte graduate in illustration and drawing, Sward just recently joined Hooker and Moore as an apprentice, quickly acclimating to the duo’s fast-pace, sweeping output. He called his work a “comic book representation of the villains that make up Hooker, Moore, and company.” The result is …
Charlotte’s Arthur Brouthers is a name known in both local and international circles, from local galleries to the walls of Art Basal. Pouring acrylics and other chemical agents onto the canvas, Brouthers forged an abstract sensibility that garnered widespread attention. Over the past few years, others took notice and started using his honed technique for themselves. He took this as …
One might guess that seasoned hands crafted the scene of a fireside robot with a celestial backdrop. Yet, Emily Isaacs, a student at Myers Park High School, juggled the piece alongside final exams and school projects. Creating a work of art on a garage door was an unexpected opportunity for the Charlotte teen, whose only previous mural experience was “painting …
Jen Hill’s Foxy Brown-inspired painting is continues the artist’s Pop dominance on walls around Charlotte, both inhabiting the interiors of local businesses and facing the public. Hill moves between realistic portraiture, pulp recreations, and lively signage, yet all of her work is packed with bursts of color. Contained within the hair of Hill’s version of Pam Grier is a contained …
It began with a one-off live painting project for The Edison in Plaza Midwood several years ago. From there, an alliance between Matt Hooker and Matt Moore evolved into the city’s most prolific street art team yet. Often called “The Matts” in shorthand, the pair have found a citywide canvas in Charlotte. The Gama Goat was a six-wheel, semi-amphibious vehicles …
Artist Ryan Williams says that he chose to depict a version of Queen Charlotte that reflected his “own personal queen”: his grandmother. He worked with cousin Rebecca Lowery to craft a portrait of their family’s matriarch. Their Queen Charlotte is also supposed to represent “an older, wiser, much more understanding Charlotte, an idea that stands in contrast to the all …
Andy Rocco’s door is among the most abstract of the Boileryard murals. Yet, he’s known around the city for his vibrant portraits of pop culture figures, whether it’s Elvis Presley or Lebron James. The emerging artist has been commissioned, most often, to capture the icons of the Queen City, rendering our most famous athletes and leaders in his Pop Art …
Alex Howlett takes a look at the history of Camp North End through an unexpected lens. The Fort Mill High School student captures a scene ripped from the Golden Age of animation, which like the site, emerged out of the 1920s. The sweet narrative of a boy and his dog dancing has become a favorite on the site, even if …
Osiris Rain’s bold, elegant figures tell of his formal training at Italy’s Angel Academy of Art and time assisting famed painter Odd Nerdrum in Norway. Over the past few years, he’s traded oils for spraypaint and took this sensibility to public spaces across Charlotte, his current home. The artist’s practice has flourished with the move, allowing him to “work larger …
Dr. Dax is a trusted name in Atlanta’s graffiti and hip-hop scene, with associations with the collective that produced OutKast and Goodie Mob. This is the artist’s first “planned” mural in Charlotte. His past work in the Carolinas hasn’t exactly been sanctioned, as his history as a street artists saw his work adorn freight trains across the Southeast. The recent …
Dammit Wesley is known as a connector, as the operator of on-site gallery and studio BlkMrktCLT and one of the architects behind the viral Durag Festival. His space at Camp North End has become known for the “Let’s Talk Dammit,” where artists meet to critique, discuss the challenges of being a working artist, and navigate the Charlotte art scene together. …
HNin Nie’s artistic practice is centered on gallery-sized paintings, sculpture, and illustration, so her door adorning the Ford Building was a rare adventure. Using the word “nexus” as her prompt, which embodies the surrounding festival as well, she went to work. “It’s about the center point between two different categories,” she said. “This painting connects two different people. With the …
Fayetteville, N.C.-born, Atlanta-based artist Fabian Williams went hyper-local with his ode to Charlotte figure Dorothy Counts-Scoggins. Her famous walk to Harding High School in 1957 is one of the enduring images of the Civil Rights era, and today, she’s still helping to better public schools in Charlotte. Charlotteans today primarily know her as that brave child or as the beloved …
Montreal’s Maxille Martel (a.k.a., “Mono Sourcil”) made the long trek down to Charlotte to bring her quirky, comic-inspired characters to the exterior of the Ford Factory. When channeled through each of the artists in the line-up, the weekend’s themes of technology and innovation saw vastly different interpretations. “I took that theme of ‘technology’ and went in the direction of robots, …
Like the massive works by The London Police, the two murals painted by Barcelona’s KRAM are actually a continuous scene. Though his popular Instagram account carries the tagline, “wasting spray paint since 1997,” KRAM has a reputation for activating and enhancing spaces in different corners of the world. When he came here to Charlotte, he was fresh off projects for …
Three of the “14 Doors” are occupied by work facilitated by Living Walls, the Atlanta-based nonprofit “focused on bringing representation and celebration to different communities,” said their Peru-born executive director, Monica Campana, at the event. In Charlotte, that meant organizing the project “Ladies to the Front,” celebrating and honoring “the women and those women identifying, the sisters, the mothers and …
Three of the “14 Doors” are occupied by work facilitated by Living Walls, the Atlanta-based nonprofit “focused on bringing representation and celebration to different communities,” said their Peru-born executive director, Monica Campana, at the event. In Charlotte, that meant organizing the project “Ladies to the Front,” celebrating and honoring “the women and those women identifying, the sisters, the mothers and …
Three of the “14 Doors” are occupied by work facilitated by Living Walls, the Atlanta-based nonprofit “focused on bringing representation and celebration to different communities,” said their Peru-born executive director, Monica Campana, at the event. In Charlotte, that meant organizing the project “Ladies to the Front,” celebrating and honoring “the women and those women identifying, the sisters, the mothers and …
The most abstract mural in this collection comes from Atlanta artist and musician Addison Adams. Even apart from his music career, the artist’s interests are many: drawings, paintings, and sculpture, often intermingling in his installation-based shows. His gallery work moves between extracting objects from the everyday and the amorphous forms that are part of his signature canvas work. But as …
Ezekiel Holley, son of beloved Atlanta visual artist and musician Lonnie Holley, came to Charlotte to recreate the work of legendary quiltmaker and printmaker Louisiana Bendolph in the form of a mural. Bendolph is associated with The Quilts of Gee’s Bend, a group of famed African-American women crafting quilts along the Alabama River. (Her mother-in-law, Mary Lee Bendolph, is one …
Even rendered in black and white, James Moore’s illusionary installations and murals are vivid visions of what could be ahead for humankind and technology. The artist was behind one of the biggest murals created during End-to-End, and that techno-futurist aesthetic underscored the event’s focus on innovation. His work has been described as blending “fine art, brand collaborations, and hyper engagement …
More than 20 years ago, a few artists from England relocated to Amsterdam, and on the bare, derelict walls across the city, they saw opportunities. The London Police since emerged as one of the most beloved names inside both the street art and gallery spheres, leaving their sardonic, instantly recognizable marks across the globe.
If the shapes and characters in Brandon Sadler’s “14 Doors” mural look familiar, it’s likely because of a certain film set in the fictional land of Wakanda. Sadler, who works under the name “Riding Red Lotus,” designed murals in a lab prominently featured in Black Panther. (Breakout character Shuri’s lab, in particular, where she unveils the hero’s suits and much …
Rosalia Torres-Weiner is the artist and activist (or “ARTivist,” as she says) behind Red Calaca Studio. During END-to-END, the Charlotte artist was charged with transforming a wall on the side of the co-working space Hygge, which has five sites total across Charlotte. As with much of her electric and eclectic work, Torres-Weiner calls upon the iconography and motifs of her …
Dowell, a much-revered figure in the Charlotte arts scene since arriving in 2000, is no stranger to public art. The Houston native has an ongoing relationship with the city’s transportation system, crafting major works for an I-277 underpass mural, the 25th Street lightrail stop, and other transit hotspots. For this specific mural, she allowed the industrial backdrop and history of …
Three of the “14 Doors” are occupied by work facilitated by Living Walls, the Atlanta-based nonprofit “focused on bringing representation and celebration to different communities,” said their Peru-born executive director, Monica Campana, at the event. In Charlotte, that meant organizing the project “Ladies to the Front,” celebrating and honoring “the women and those women identifying, the sisters, the mothers and …
Nalee Thao, also known as Narly, describes herself as a “creative disruptor and mischief maker.” A mural on the side of MacFly Fresh Printing Co. needed some of that fun and stylish energy, so Thao worked with artist Jennifer Harrison to create this profiled woman with creative energy escaping from her headphones. As with many projects on the site, this …
Windy O’Connor’s abstract forms and figurative “Chica” paintings have appeared on traditional canvases, fabrics, pillows, wallpapers, and fashion apparel. But the garage doors of her Camp North End studio offer her first exterior mural. In her artist’s statement describing the “Chica” women included on this mural, her purpose is described as communicating “the beauty she sees in every person around …
Jen Hill was one of the first artists to contribute to the site, her Foxy Brown-inspired painting a favorite in the Boileryard. Her new mural within the “14 Doors” arises from the same era: a Polaroid camera with a technicolor output that spills onto the wall. For her END-to-END creation, she enlisted fellow original Camp North End artist Matt Hooker …
“Bonkers” is the word cartoonist and illustrator Dustin Harbin uses to describe the scale of his work at Free Range Brewing’s Camp North End location. He doesn’t typically work this big; in fact, he rarely works larger than 5 inches by 7 inches. The brewery’s buzzing exterior art started with a design even smaller than that, so “working out bigger …
Wall Poem on the Gama Goat Building The ongoing Wall Poems project, founded in 2013, inhabits public spaces around the region. Camp North End’s is located in the Keswick district, wrapped around 500-plus feet of a structure’s exterior. For this Wall Poem, co-founder Amy Bagwell worked with fellow Goodyear Arts Collective artists Blaine Hurdle and Holly Keogh. This project is …
The surface of the silo on Camp North End’s Graham Street side wasn’t always so smooth. It took pressure-washing, sandblasting, and double-priming to get the once-rusty tower of metal to a paintable state. It’s difficult to imagine that former life now, as Matt Moore’s elegant, techno-futuristic queen looks toward the city and anchors the massive, isometric mural running alongside the …
Comprising one-fourth of a mile, Matt Moore’s work on 1701-1801 N. Graham St. could be the largest mural in the Southeastern United States. Moore—known as a premier muralist of the region and for his partnership with studiomate Matt Hooker—says it was also his most difficult job to date. Over three months, he gradually crafted this massive, singular work on corrugated …
Jen Hill brings her splattered hues to three stacked shipping containers, which now serve as one of the site’s most prominent markers. The massive project, with its stenciled CAMP NORTH END text and logo, was documented by videographer Matthew Spivey. His images from Hill’s project give us a peek into how she pulled it off: The process saw Hill using …
“Love Shack” by Kent Youngstrom The original guard house still stands at Camp North End’s Statesville Avenue entrance. In the spring of 2020, Charlotte transplant Kent Youngstrom was asked to transform the structure, bringing his blend of abstract painting and text art to an unusual—and complicated—canvas. He says he chose these bright hues and textures with the aim to draw …