Arlington Art Truck
The Arlington Art Truck season 3 kicks off April 2020 delivering interactive art projects to where you live, work, and play! Photo © Ellman studio, LLC
The Arlington Art Truck is a curated mobile tool box for artists-in-residence to engage the public from April to October in interactive art projects designed to blur the line between participant and presenter, citizen and government. The Arlington Art Truck was nominated for the 2019 Robert E. Gard Award from Americans for the Arts and launched in 2018 with a National Endowment for the Arts grant.
Learn more about the Arlington Art Truck 2020 season below and see the past seasons here.
2020 Activations
Upcoming Activations
The Arlington Art Truck is parked until we can all gallivant around together again. Until then, feel free to connect with your community through this interactive social media project with Arlington artists:
Words to Art Spring 2020
An Arlington Community Art Project by Sushmita Mazumdar
Monday April 27- Sunday, May 24 2020
Give artists ONE WORD expressing your feelings and perception of the #COVID19 quarantine and watch them transform it into art! Arlington Arts will ask you to post new words every Monday for the next four weeks. Artist Sushmita Mazumdar and four other Arlington artists will turn select words from your submissions into original sketches to be posted on our social media throughout the weekend. The finished works will be posted on Sushmita’s website, Studio Pause.
Make your own artwork expressing a word at home and post it with #WordsToArtArlington. You can also share it at home in your window, or as chalk art on the sidewalk!
This project was originally designed by Sushmita Mazumdar in 2018 for Art on the ART Bus. The 2020 version takes a new angle by asking you to collaborate.
Participating artists:
Sushmita Mazumdar (Buckingham)
David Amoroso (Douglas Park)
Maribeth Egan (Ballston/Virginia Square)
Kate Fleming (Maywood)
MasPaz (Arlington Ridge)
Greetings from Our Microbiome! by Shelly Smith
The work of Arlington artist Shelly Smith focuses on microscopic life found in water and soil. The artist has illustrated five postcards, featuring the diversity of microorganisms found in five different bodies of water in Arlington, including a bog, vernal pool, and stream. Come examine the living creatures through a microscope, paint the postcards yourself, and then mail them to friends.
Water run-off from our yards and streets not only affects the health of our waterways but it also impacts the larger ecosystem, including trees and plants. The Office of Sustainability and Environmental Management is our community partner, and they will be with us to share how we can be better stewards of the natural environment by reducing stormwater runoff and pollution at home.
MAKE & TAKE: Watercolor postcards to mail
MEET: Shelly Smith, Arlington artist and a representative from the County’s Office of Sustainability and Environmental Management
LEARN: About the importance of Arlington County waterways and how we all can make an effort to protect them.
THESE DATES ARE SUBJECT TO CHANGE DUE TO THE EVOLVING CIRCUMSTANCES OF THE COVID-19 EPIDEMIC.
Saturday, June 6 –Rock ‘n’ Recycle- Solid Waste Bureau Open House, 2700 S. Taylor Street, (go to the top of the hill- free parking on levels 2 and 3 of garage on left) 9-2pm– CANCELLED
Friday, June 19 – Juneteenth with the Black Heritage Museum of Arlington, Virginia, parking lot of Mount Salvation Baptist Church, 1961 N Culpeper St., time TBD CANCELLED
Saturday, June 20 – 25th Annual Columbia Pike Blues Festival, Columbia Pike and S. Walter Reed, 1-8:30pm CANCELLED as an in person event, instead, please tune into WERA 96.7 FM, 5-7pm to hear the Columbia Pike Backyard Blues Event.
Thursday, June 25 – Ballston Farmers Market, Welburn Square, 901 N. Taylor St., 3-7pm
Thursday, July 2 –Ballston Mega Market (Ballston Farmers Market with more!), Welburn Square, 901 N. Taylor St., 3-7pm
Tuesday, July 21 – Crystal City Farmers Market, 2121 Crystal Dr., 3-7pm
Wednesday, July 29– Rosslyn Farmers Market, Central Place Plaza, 1800 N Lynn St., 3-7pm
Friday, August 14 – Arlington County Fair, 3-9pm- TBD
Saturday, August 15 – Arlington County Fair, 3-9pm-TBD
Learn about the birds that migrate through our area each autumn, and those that are threatened by loss of habitat in Virginia. Artist Greg Stewart and a team of James Madison University students will be on-hand to facilitate your artmaking. You can select from a library of laser cut names of fall migrating birds, then stencil them onto the ground with sifted soil and create a bird sculpture with clay and native seeds in the shape of the threatened birds to take and plant.
Our community partner for this project is Arlington County’s Urban Forestry Office, who will offer you tips on tree care, grant opportunities for free trees and will be sharing information and collecting input from the public on their Urban Forest Master Plan and Natural Resources Management Plan revision. The Urban Forest Master Plan addresses the conservation, planting and maintenance of trees in Arlington County, preserving a healthy ecosystem, and the Natural Resources Management Plan looks to conserve and enhance the unique ecosystems in our parks.
This project is developed in partnership with James Madison University, Harrisonburg, Virginia.
MAKE & TAKE: A sculpture in the shape of threatened birds made of native Arlington seeds and clay to plant in your own yard. Stencil the names of migrating birds on the ground. View threatened birds through a 3D View-Master.
MEET: Greg Stewart, sculptor, students from James Madison University and Arlington County’s Arborist.
LEARN: About birds and trees of Arlington County, the Urban Forest Master Plan and Natural Resources Management Plan revision.
THESE DATES ARE SUBJECT TO CHANGE DUE TO THE EVOLVING CIRCUMSTANCES OF THE COVID-19 EPIDEMIC.
Saturday, September 12, Rosslyn Jazz Fest, Gateway Park, 1300 Lee Highway , 1-7pm
Saturday, September 19, Green Valley Day, Drew Model Elementary School, 3500 23rd South, 12-6pm
Sunday, September 27, Arlington Valley Fest, Arlington Valley Fest, 2709 S Oakland Street, 12-5pm
Friday, October 2, Latin Heritage Festival, Arlington Mill Community Center, 909 S Dinwiddie St, Arlington, VA 22204, 5-9pm
Thursday, October 15, Gunston Middle School, 2700 S Lang St, Arlington, VA 22206 (not open to public), 7:50am- 2:40pm
Tuesday, October 20, Crystal City Farmers Market, 3-7pm, 2121 Crystal Dr., 3-7pm
Sunday, October 25, Fairlington Farmers Market, 3308 S Stafford Street, 9-1pm
Saturday, October 31, Marymount Farmers Market, 2807 N Glebe Road, 9-1pm CANCELLED
The Desegregation of Arlington Lunch Counters: 60th Anniversary Tribute by Amos Paul Kennedy, Jr. POSTPONED UNTIL 2021
In response to the COVID-19 pandemic, the Arlington Art Truck’s first activation of the season will be postponed until spring 2021. While the public activation has been postponed until next year, those who ride the Art on the ART Bus can continue to draw inspiration, as Amos Kennedy’s work focusing on the desegregation of Arlington’s lunch counters in 1960 will continue to be on-display well into 2021.
Commemorate the lunch counter sit-ins that occurred in Arlington County as you letterpress cards with printer Amos Paul Kennedy, Jr., or Arlington printmaker Justyne Fischer. The sit-ins were peaceful protests that challenged widespread segregation policies. Kennedy has designed seven cards to commemorate the sit-in protests that occurred from June 9-22, 1960. A different quote from one of the participants or community members involved in the historic protests will be available to print at each activation. To collect all seven, visit the Arlington Art Truck each week! On site will be representatives from our community partner the Black Heritage Museum of Arlington offering information about their organization. Drop-in visitors at various activations will periodically include Joan Mulholland, Arlington resident, civil rights activist, and participant in the Arlington sit-ins as well as Serena Bolliger, Arlington’s Historic Preservation program staff.
For more information on the desegregation of lunch counters in Arlington, please go here.
This project is organized by the Arlington Art Truck, Arlington Public Art, programs of Arlington Arts in collaboration with the County’s Historic Preservation Program, Arlington Public Library’s Center for Local History and Arlington Transit’s Art on the ART bus program.
MAKE & TAKE: A new letter-pressed card at each weekly location. Collect all seven!
MEET: Amos Paul Kennedy, Jr., Justyne Fischer, printers and a representative from the Black Heritage Museum of Arlington
LEARN: About the desegregation of Arlington’s lunch counters through seven sit-in protests that occurred from June 9-22, 1960.
Behind The Art Truck Design
Photo copyright 2017 Cynthia Connolly
The Arlington Art Truck’s exterior has colorful and witty illustrations hand painted by internationally renowned artist Stephen Powers. Stephen worked alongside Arlington Art Truck curator Cynthia Connolly to create a “parade of usual and unusual art supplies” including Cynthia’s saddle shoes and Leica camera as a nod to their collaboration. Paying homage to his start as a graffiti artist and tagger, the blank side of the Truck outlined in dotted lines will feature magnetic interchangeable letters in his signature style. About the Artist