Baltimore’s Artscape festival will shift from August to May in 2025, will be shortened from three days to two, and will be produced by the City of Baltimore and not the independent Baltimore Office of Promotion and the Arts.
Mayor Brandon Scott on Monday revealed the changes as part of an announcement about dates for four major city festivals in 2025.
The dates for Artscape 2025 are Saturday, May 24, and Sunday, May 25 — the Memorial Day weekend. It will be the first time since the 1980s that Artscape has been held in the spring. Last year’s partially rained-out event was held on August 2, 3 and 4. In 2023, it was held in September and also was partially rained-out. For most of its 40-year history, Artscape has been held in July.
Scott said the Artscape dates were shifted to avoid the inhospitable weather that has plagued the festival the past two years. He said the change also makes Artscape the first of four major 2025 summer festivals.
“We heard you loud and clear about how hot and rainy and stormy it is at Artscape,” Scott said.
The other events for which Scott announced dates are:
- Afram, currently the city’s largest festival, which will occur around the Juneteenth holiday on Saturday, June 21, and Sunday, June 22. The location is Druid Hill Park.
- The Baltimore Caribbean Festival, which will be held on Friday, July 11, Saturday, July 12 and Sunday, July 13, with a parade on July 12. The location will be Druid Hill Park.
- Charm City Live, which will be held on Saturday, September 20. In the past, the one-day event has been held near City Hall.
Scott called the events “cornerstones of our communities that provide opportunities for local artists to shine, for businesses to thrive, and most importantly, for our residents, and visitors to come together and build lasting connections.”
Scott said details such as festival headliners will be announced next year, closer to their dates. Asked about the location of Artscape, which has traditionally been held in the Mount Royal cultural district and the Station North arts district, he said information about the exact boundaries will come out later but “we know it will be somewhere that we’re all familiar with.”
Scott asked other groups not to apply for city event permits on the same dates as the four major festivals.
As of January 1, he said, the city will be updating its special events calendar to help ease collaboration and planning efforts for events across Baltimore, allowing city agencies to allocate resources more effectively and facilitate better coordination with external partners.
Scott said the updated calendar will include open “non-permit” dates so community leaders and others can plan events around the availability of city services. In the past, some groups have had to cancel or postpone an event, such as Remfest in Remington, because of conflicts.
“Don’t plan anything on any of the days that we have just laid out,” he warned other groups. “Those permits will not be approved. We have to plan around those large-scale events…We want to make the event-planning process as smooth as possible…Together, we can help make the hundreds and hundreds and hundreds of community events in Baltimore that we all love very successful in 2025 and beyond.”
Scott said the city will for the first time be producing the Baltimore Caribbean Festival, which will mark its 44th year in 2025. Past Caribbean festivals have been produced and funded by a private group, the Caribbean American Carnival Association of Baltimore Inc. That group will collaborate with the city on the 2025 festival, said Dr. Elaine Simon, Founder, President and CEO.
Scott also he is issuing an executive order to establish the Baltimore Advisory Commission on Caribbean Affairs to help strengthen ties between his office, the City Council, all city agencies and city residents “on issues affecting the community…including the festival.”
BOPA has been the city’s events producer for years, but Baltimore’s Board of Estimates voted in November to terminate its contract with BOPA effective January 20. Next year will be the first year that Artscape will be held without BOPA or its predecessor organizations serving as the lead producer or co-producer.
Asked about the budget for Artscape, Scott said the city will now fund the event, in part by using money that is not going to BOPA. He said a budget request for Artscape 2025 will go to the Board of Estimates for approval, just as a budget request for Afram goes to the Board of Estimates for approval.
Before its contract with the city ends, BOPA is obligated to put on two more events, the New Year’s Eve fireworks display at the Inner Harbor and the Martin Luther King Jr. Day parade in January.
Officials in New York City have announced that their city will not have its major fireworks show this year because of drought conditions there, and the fireworks display at the Dec. 5 holiday lighting of Baltimore’s Washington Monument was cancelled because of high winds and other fires in the city.
Scott said the fireworks portion of Baltimore’s New Year’s festivities will be held as long as it’s safe to do so – “I don’t control the weather” — but the drone light show that was held last year will not be part of this year’s spectacle.
