Full Lineup Revealed For the 2023 Dollar Bank Three Rivers Arts Festival

The 64th annual Dollar Bank Three Rivers Arts Festival, a production of the Pittsburgh Cultural Trust, returns to the Cultural District, June 2-11, offering 10 days of free art and music for the community. Hundreds of artists from around the region and nation join previously announced featured music concerts to bring more music on multiple stages, gallery exhibitions, public art, film, theater, creative activities for all ages, and the popular Artist Market. Artists and events can be sorted by day and genre at TrustArts.org/TRAF.

"We learned a lot last year and are now building on the successes of our first Festival located entirely in the Cultural District," said Sarah Aziz, Director of Festival Management for the Pittsburgh Cultural Trust. "We're excited to deliver a full spectrum of free arts and entertainment experiences in an improved layout for Pittsburgh and visitors to our community. We thank Dollar Bank and all our partners for making it possible."

"Dollar Bank is once again proud to partner with the Cultural Trust for this wonderful experience for our region. Bringing hundreds of thousands of people together every June to experience free art and music is a great illustration of our commitment to enriching the lives of the people in our communities," said James McQuade, Dollar Bank President & CEO.

Among the newly detailed visual arts attractions is the annual Juried Visual Art Exhibition-a storied cornerstone of the Festival showcasing exceptional new art by regional artists selected by a guest panel in a blind jury process. This year's show, Taking Up Space, located in SPACE Gallery (812 Liberty Avenue), highlights the ways artists take up space within their practices physically, psychologically, emotionally, and relationally. Jurors Steve Alexis, Lexi Bishop, Jillian Daniels, and Tara Fay Coleman challenged artists to reckon with the way individuals are made to feel unworthy or undeserving of taking up space and how artmaking challenges that notion. The show is generously supported by the Bessie F. Anathan Charitable Trust of The Pittsburgh Foundation.

The Artist Market returns at full scale, boasting more than 300 artists for the first time since before the pandemic. Artists from around the region and nation will sell their fine art and fine crafts in a new layout spanning both sides of Fort Duquesne Boulevard, stretching between 6th and 9th Streets. The adjusted footprint will provide more space for shoppers to circulate between booths compared to previous layouts. Artists will changeover throughout the Festival's 10-day run.

The nearby Backyard at 8th & Penn hosts three multidisciplinary public art attractions, including Utterance by Pittsburgh-based, nationally recognized sculptor, Jim West. The symbolic mixed-media sculpture uses illumination and volume control to explore how humans need to quiet the noise, and not talk over one another, to hear and be heard. West's Point of View sculpture of George Washington and Guyasuta is well known to Pittsburgh audiences.

We Are All Connected To Each Other Through Nature, a 12'x12'x18' walkthrough installation also located in the Backyard, was created by Los Angeles-based artist Laurie Shapiro. Shapiro uses water-based paints and screen-printed drawings on vinyl over metal truss with handmade lighting. The work is presented in association with this year's Anthropology of Motherhood sponsored by Allegheny Health Network-an annual art space, interactive amenity, and place of respite for families with young children located inside 819 Penn Avenue, which neighbors the Backyard.

Squonk's Hand to Hand, which premiered in PPG Plaza in 2019 (co-commissioned by the Pittsburgh Downtown Partnership), returns to Pittsburgh for two final performances on June 10 and 11 at 12 pm and 3 pm in the Backyard. Propelled by two giant puppet hands, each the size of a house and rigged like a sailing ship, the performance adds Squonk's original progressive rock for a journey that is spectacular, plaintive, and comic.

Nearby, the Backyard Stage will be active every day, hosting more than 15 performances by an array of Pittsburgh-based artists. The Green Mountain Energy Stage, active on weekends only at the nearby corner of Fort Duquesne Boulevard and 7th Street, will add to the atmosphere with two shows each Saturday and Sunday. These two stages complement daily activity on the Dollar Bank Main Stage, including previously announced featured music concerts every evening and now 15 additional shows by regional and nationally touring artists.

The Giant Eagle Creativity Zone returns to Trust Oasis (133 7th Street) featuring 20 treasured arts organizations and community partners from throughout the region. Families can expect hands-on activities, 12-6 pm daily, with new organizations to discover on return visits during the Festival's 10 days.

Moving indoors, the Harris Theater will provide free screenings of the political thriller with a rock band at the heart of the action, What the Hell Happened to Blood, Sweat, and Tears; the story of the Black queer origins of rock 'n' roll, Little Richard: I Am Everything; and the fascinating behind-the-scenes documentary featuring Thelonious Monk, Rewind and Play.

The Pittsburgh Cultural Trust's gallery spaces will be activated, too, with hours extended to match the Festival's 12-8 pm operation. Traveling While Black, a cinematic virtual reality experience that immerses viewers in the long history of restriction of movement for Black Americans and the creation of safe spaces in communities, will run at 820 Liberty Gallery. The internationally recognized UVA (United Visual Artists), a London-based collective, continues their run at Wood Street Galleries. Juried Visual Art Exhibition juror, Steve Alexis, has his own show at 707 Penn Gallery called in spite of me, here you are.

Lights will go up in the Trust Arts Education Center (805-807 Liberty Avenue) when Pittsburgh Playwrights Theatre Company presents 12:52 The Mike Webster Story and the Trust Arts Education Department welcomes families to the Glow Zone for glow-in-the-dark fun with a live DJ and hands-on activities.

All events are subject to change. Lineup changes and additions will be continually updated at TrustArts.org/TRAF.

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