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ArtPop 2018: Colossal Canvases Shine Light on Local Artists

By Emily Cummins, Public Relations Coordinator
wendy-hickey-headshot

The art of ArtPop does just that. Popping out among the dense trees and faint cityscapes, the art-piece billboards of the ArtPop Street Gallery brighten the landscape of major roads from Las Vegas to Charlotte to the Lehigh Valley.

Led by founder Wendy Hickey, who has worked in marketing and billboard advertising for more than 20 years, ArtPop’s mission is to promote local artists’ work and make art accessible to communities through available media space. In the Lehigh Valley it has done so for 28 artists since 2015 through its partnership with Adams Outdoor Advertising and the nonprofit ArtsQuest, showcasing their work on billboards seen by millions of motorists each year.

Following the unveiling of the 2018 winning artists of the 4th Annual ArtPop Lehigh Valley Billboard Competition, we spoke with Hickey about how the project has grown and what impact it’s had on area artists.

AQ: How did ArtPop begin and how did you bring it to the Lehigh Valley?

WH: ArtPop began when I was serving on the board of directors for Pocono Arts Council and wanted to truly help artists in the community in which I lived and worked. I was working for Adams Outdoor Advertising of Northeastern Pennsylvania in the Poconos and I asked my boss if we could use our extra space for artists. She said yes, and so it began! At first, we didn’t even call it ArtPop, but it grew quickly and after a year of ArtPop in Charlotte, N.C., our official inaugural city, I talked with Tony Cioffi of Adams Lehigh Valley and he completely supported and wanted the program in this region! So the Lehigh Valley and Peoria, Ill. ArtPop programs were our first cities after the first program in Charlotte!

AQ: How did you come up with the concept of putting art, instead of ads, on billboards?

WH: I have been working in the advertising and billboard industry for years and know how effective they are and thought why not feature local artists in the windows of time that there are available billboards! The artists absolutely love having a canvas of this proportion and the commuters love being inspired by beautiful art while they are behind the wheel.

AQ: What’s is different about ArtPop Lehigh Valley and its partnership with ArtsQuest?

WH: The greatest addition to come out of this partnership has been the scholastic competition and partnership with Kutztown University for a scholarship for the winning student. We are in our third year now testing this in the Lehigh Valley, and we do feel it has proven to be a compelling offering for students so we definitely want to bring this to our other cities. Also Tony and his team’s signature unveiling of the student art is incredible; to see the full-size billboard unveiled in the Adams warehouse is amazing. The partnership of ArtPop, Adams, Kutztown and ArtsQuest has created one of our most powerful programs across the country! We are so grateful to all involved, and it is truly amazing to see this program grow to include Warren County, N.J., as well as people from Berks, upper Bucks, Montgomery, Lehigh and Northampton counties in Pennsylvania.

AQ: What’s the importance of having a scholastic element to the program? How do you feel these pieces compare to that of the professional artists in the competition?

WH: To let a student know that they can have a successful art career and give them the confidence early on is crucial to their success. I do not know that anyone can tell the difference between the students and the adult, professional artists. The work each year has been exceptional.

AQ: What’s the benefit of ArtPop to its winning artists?

WH: My goodness, there are so many! With ArtPop billboards, local artists become household names and further their art careers! Artists are selling more work, getting asked for original commissions, selling prints of their billboards, receiving media coverage, opening their own galleries, quitting their day jobs and becoming full-time artists as well as receiving recognition and gaining confidence! It has been an amazing opportunity for so many. More than 220 artists have been given this platform of advertising since 2014! It is a true thrill to see this all come to be, and even as ArtPop changes artists and billboards each year, we continue to share their work by up-cycling the billboard vinyl into tote bags and rehanging the billboards as canvases for gallery shows.

AQ: ArtPop has grown tremendously since its inception in 2002. Can you name some highlights and is there anything on the horizon for ArtPop?

WH: In 2002, it was just a concept we were acting on in small ways, it wasn’t even known as ArtPop; it was pure grass roots. In 2014 we created the name from “Art + Public Outdoor Project” to be the ArtPop Street Gallery, and then in 2015 we officially became a nonprofit.

Now in our fifth year we operate in nine states and 14 cities, and in 2018 we will celebrate having our first paid staff members in addition to our hardworking volunteers. As we grow, we will be working on additional offerings in Lehigh Valley like some of our other cities where we’ve added other forms like visual displays at airports, on news racks and the sides of buses. ArtPop is learning, growing and expanding. We have an amazing board of directors and are building a volunteer army across the country.

The biggest thing we’re looking forward to for ArtPop now is a matching grant, courtesy of the amazingly generous Reemprise Fund, that could change the state of public art across the country.

Our goal is to raise $40,000 by April online at www.crowdrise.com/artpopstreetgallery, and if we reach that goal we will receive a matching donation of $40,000. With a grant this large, we can only begin to imagine the artists we can support, the beauty we can bring to cities across the country and the happiness and health we can promote.

For more information on ArtPop Street Gallery and ArtPop Lehigh Valley, visit artpopstreetgallery.com and bananafactory.org/artpop.

ArtPop 2018 Billboard Competition Winners