Downtown Activation + Public Art

Sixth Street

Pittsburgh Postcard, 2022
by Phil Seth

Designed and painted by Pittsburgh native Phil Seth, this mural was created as part of efforts to enhance 6^th Street as a destination dining corridor in the heart of Downtown’s Cultural District. This work is made possible with the generous support of the Benter Foundation.

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Seventh Ave

Emerging Visions 2.0, “Send My Love to the Hill,” 2024
by Charlese Dawson

Charlese Dawson’s “Send My Love to the Hill” is a love letter to the neighborhood where she grew up, connecting the past and present of both The Hill and her own experiences to imagine the future. Complemented by poet Jhordan Price near the corner of Seventh Ave and William Penn Place, Dawson’s work invites pedestrians and drivers to pause in their commutes and journeys to contemplate the life and joys of residents of the Hill District today. She brings in the voices of poets writing about Black life and joy, friendship, and family to complement her photographs that represent a community that has undergone dramatic change, decay, and renewal.

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Strawberry Way

Rainbow Road, 2022
by Max Gonzales & Shane Pilster
and students from Pittsburgh CAPA

This new 440-foot long street mural has transformed Downtown’s Strawberry Way into a vibrant work of public art created by students of Pittsburgh Creative and Performing Arts.

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Smithfield St

Planting Seeds: Taking Steps, 2023
by Do What We Love, a Pittsburgh-based artist duo created by Max Emiliano Gonzales and Shane Pilster

The vibrant murals adorning the Frank & Seder Building at 441 Smithfield Street beautifully encapsulate nature’s tranquility and the bustling cityscape, adding a burst of color to a prominent corner of Downtown. They are part of the Pittsburgh Downtown Partnership’s Great Route Project, a transformative initiative aimed at enhancing the pedestrian experience in Downtown Pittsburgh.

The Forbes Avenue side of the building features “Planting Seeds,” a mural that celebrates the natural beauty of Pittsburgh. Its design harmonizes with the new planters installed along the Forbes Avenue corridor, turning this high traffic area into a softer streetscape with more natural textures. In contrast, “Taking Steps,” located on the bustling Fifth Avenue side, captures the essence of an active Downtown streetscape.

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Market Square

Good Service, 2024
by Rigel Richardson

Produced by the PDP, Market Square Moment is a new platform to showcase large-scale art on a 20-by-50-foot frame on the building facade of 8 Market Square, home to Pizzaiolo Primo, towering above the intersection of Market Square and Forbes Ave. This platform will allow for a new, original work of art to be selected for the display on a regular basis.

For the inaugural installation, a regional call for artists was conducted by Shiftworks, leading the selection of a painting by Pittsburgh-based Mexican American artist Rigel Richardson titled Good Service, a work inspired by the nature found in backyards and gardens in Millvale. “This painting speaks to how so many different natural and human flows need to come together to support this fleeting, vibrant portrait of life,” says Richardson. “We’re all better together, contributing positively to our shared communities, helping ensure our collective wellbeing, and living in collaboration with the natural world.”

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Greedy Pigeons, 2022
by Josie Norton

One Oxford Centre

Elemental, 2024
Carolina Loyola-Garcia

Coming August 2024

Elemental is a site-specific multi-channel video installation designed to showcase a loop of nature videos depicting the ocean, an active erupting volcano, snow, wind, sunsets, clouds, and flora. The alternating footage of nature provides passersby a moment to wonder and a window into worlds far from the downtown business atmosphere. It is meant to serve as a moment of respite or as an invitation to a few minutes of meditation or solace. Read artist statement.

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Around Downtown

Emerging Visions, 2023
Various artists

This collaboration with Silver Eye Center for Photography features the works of rising Pittsburgh artists on the windows of currently vacant storefronts along Liberty Ave., creating a public art gallery in the heart of Downtown.

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Skinny Building Mural, 2023
by Alexis Gideon, Loring Taoka, and Sophia Marie Pappas

The Art Supply Co. worked with PNC Bank to reimagine the historical Skinny Building in Downtown Pittsburgh with support from the Pittsburgh Downtown Partnership. The result is the Art in the Heart program, a large-scale mural project which covers the second and third story windows of one of the world’s narrowest commercial buildings. With theater lights placed strategically inside, the piece becomes a lightbox at night and encourages viewing at all hours.  

Through an open call for regional artists, three artists were chosen to participate in a paid design process: Alexis Gideon, Loring Taoka, and Sophia Marie Pappas.

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Judah, 2022
by Curtis Reeves

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Downtown Renown, 2020
by Gavin Benjamin

The “Downtown Renown” installation features 14 artworks and stories that celebrate the careers of Pittsburgh sports icons and athletic groundbreakers. Installed in windows around Downtown, find artistic renderings of household names from Mario Lemieux and Franco Harris, to Swin Cash, Dan McCoy, and more, showcasing a breadth of talent and accomplishments that is truly inspirational.

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Garrison Place

Garrison Canal, 2018
by Andrea Polli

If you were disappointed to see the beautiful lighted artwork, Energy Flow, disappear from the Rachel Carson Bridge, you will be happy to learn that lighted elements of the original artwork have been re-used to create a dynamic new piece: Garrison Canal. Andrea Polli, who created the original work, has created the new light work which turns the Garrison Place alleyway into an imaginary underwater future world of big data.

Visitors to the Canal “swim” below a wave of thousands of shimmering lights that transform color and animate in response to real-time changes in the local weather conditions from a weather station Downtown.

The Pittsburgh Downtown Partnership commissioned this piece as a wonderful opportunity to reuse elements of work that was much-loved by Pittsburghers and visitors alike. The project is part of a larger initiative to enliven Downtown alleyways with lighting, artwork, and pedestrian enhancements. Garrison Canal can be viewed in Garrison Place, between the 900 block of Liberty Avenue and Exchange Way.

“Garrison Canal continues the effort of many in Downtown to utilize art to encourage exploration of our beautiful built environment” said Jeremy Waldrup, President and CEO of the Pittsburgh Downtown Partnership. “Enhancing unexpected places through art makes a neighborhood unique, enjoyable and accessible for everyone.”

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Mellon Square

Paint The Town Purple, 2024
by Babesburgh

Babesburgh is proud to launch Paint the Town Purple, a new public art exhibition funded by the Pittsburgh Downtown Partnership’s Placemaking Grant. Paint the Town Purple offers passersby a chance to see a visual, historical representation of 16 important women in Pittsburgh as imagined and illustrated by four Pittsburgh-based female artists. These incredible, colorful illustrations will be on display along Smithfield Street, at Mellon Square Park.

“I’m immensely grateful for the opportunity to uplift and depict so many influential Pittsburgh women who made such an impact,” said Emily Paige Armstrong, one of the artists involved in the project, along with Janel Young, Stella Begnal, and Ifeoma Igwe.

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Cultural District

Coffey Way

Shadow Gallery, 2024
by Clear Story

The Pittsburgh Downtown Partnership (PDP) has unveiled a new site-specific artistic lighting installation on Coffey Way between Sixth Avenue and Strawberry Way. With support from the PDP’s Uncommon & Curated Fund and a grant provided by the Colcom Foundation, the Shadow Gallery was created by Pittsburgh-based lighting design and production firm Clear Story, and is now operational in the evening hours.

“The installation creates an experiential conversation between the patterns of light projection across the surfaces of Coffey Way and the images contained within the lightboxes,” said Rob Long, Principal and Design Director of Clear Story, a Pittsburgh-based design and consulting firm.

Cultural Trust Projects

Explore 13 different public art projects installed throughout the Cultural District in Downtown, including large-scale sculptural pieces, temporary activations, and art you can interact with.