72 Hours of Art Immersion in Charlotte

Brimming with cultural richness, the city’s ever-evolving arts scene offers something memorable for everyone who visits.

CRVA-Confetti Hearts Wall Mural -89-v2.png

It’s the first Friday of the month in Charlotte’s South End, and the atmosphere is buzzing. The neighborhood's many galleries have extended their hours into the evening, beckoning the public with a glowing atmosphere and light refreshments perfect for perusing works of contemporary art and printmaking, while artists in mediums ranging from watercolor to stained glass have opened up their studio spaces, allowing visitors to get a glimpse behind-the-scenes. Winding through the heart of the neighborhood, along its light rail tracks, is the South End Rail Trail, where patrons pack into adjacent bars and restaurants and families meander along the 3.5-mile-long pathway, encountering various art installations like the Color Forest by Ivan Toth Depena—a brilliant display of brightly painted poles in shades of green, blue, and orange, lining either side of the trail—and murals highlighting doughnuts, bottlecaps, and North Carolina’s coastal history en route.

From these South End First Friday gallery crawls to interactive art walks and world-class museums, Charlotte’s art scene is flourishing. In fact, North Carolina’s most populous city features everything from realist paintings to experimental sculptures for visitors and local residents alike. With so much to do and see, the only trick is knowing where to start. Read on to learn about the can’t-miss art destinations perfect for a long weekend in the Queen City.

Day 1 - The Levine Center for the Arts

One of the city’s major cultural destinations, the Levine Center for the Arts is an expansive multi-building complex that contains three of Charlotte’s most prominent art museums—the Bechtler Museum of Modern Art, the Harvey B. Gantt Center for African-American Arts + Culture, and the Mint Museum Uptown—as well as a performing arts venue. While each institution can be easily explored on its own, the Levine Center for the Arts Pass provides two-day access to all three museums for only $20. Here’s what this small fee gets you:

Bechtler Museum of Modern Art

72 Hours of Art Immersion in Charlotte — *The Firebird*, Niki de Saint Phalle

The 36,500-square-foot Bechtler Museum of Modern Art showcases mid-20th-century modern art with works from such masters as Edgar Degas, Pablo Picasso, and German painter Max Ernst, a pioneer of Surrealism in Europe. Its permanent collection includes more than 1,400 paintings, prints, sculptures, and textiles, all which reflect on contemporary experimentation with abstract art. Just outside the Bechtler, in the museum’s own welcome plaza, stands one of its most legendary works of art: French-American sculptor Niki de Saint Phalle’s “Le Grand Oiseau de Feu Sur l’Arche” (The Firebird). At more than 17-feet-tall, this monumental bird-like sculpture is covered in 7,500 pieces of fine mirrored and colored glass. Local residents lovingly refer to it as the “Disco Chicken.”

Harvey B. Gantt Center for African-American Arts + Culture

Marking its 50th anniversary in 2024, the Harvey B. Gantt Center for African-American Arts + Culture is dedicated to the art, history and culture of African Americans and people of African descent. Freelon Group Architects—which later became the lead architects for Smithsonian’s National Museum of African American History and Culture in Washington D.C.—designed the four-story center. It’s home to The Hewitt Collection of African American Art, 58 distinct works created by 20 Black-American artists, all masters of their craft, including Charlotte native Romare Bearden, Hale Woodruff, a painter, draftsman, and printer best known for his murals, and sculptor and graphic artist Elizabeth Catlett, whose work often focused on the Black-American female experience. The space also hosts rotating exhibits like the current A Superlative Palette: Contemporary Black Women Artists, which runs through August.

Mint Museum Uptown

Established in 1936 as North Carolina’s first art museum, the Mint Museum Uptown houses several permanent collections. Front-and-center is its internationally renowned Craft + Design collection, an assemblage of glass, studio jewelry, studio furniture, and more that focuses on 21st century pieces. Other outstanding compilations include American Art—spanning the fields of Federal portraiture, 19th century landscape painting (including works of the Hudson River School painters), and early 20th century realism—and Native American art forms such as performance masks, textiles, and contemporary ceramics. The museum even hosts the first installation in America’s southeast to explore the use of science and math in creating craft art and design.

What’s more, admission to the Mint includes access to its sister location: the historic Mint Museum Randolph, located three miles south in what was the first branch of the United States Mint. Its collections range from African art to fashion.

Each Friday evening is Culture & Cuisine Night at the Mint Museum Uptown. Simply book a reservation at its onsite restaurant, Mariposa, and secure two tickets to the museum in the process. Since the Mint Museum Uptown extends its hours until 9 p.m. on Fridays, whether you opt for the multicultural dining experience (think shareable dishes like pulled duck arepas and Thai green curry) or stroll through the exhibits first, is completely up to you.

Day 2 - Outdoor Art and Art-centric Walking Tours

Charlotte’s art scene extends well beyond the boundaries of any four walls, and its public art reflects the city’s energy and diversity. Take “Ascendus” by Ed Carpenter, the wing-like, tilted piece made up of galvanized and stainless steel, aluminum, and laminated glass that stands at the entrance to Charlotte Douglas International Airport. This 60-foot-tall sculpture is suggestive of flight and has become a prominent icon for airport visitors. Another popular public art piece is “Metalmorphosis” by David Cerny, a mirrored sculpture consisting of 40 steel pieces, including seven rotating segments, which adorns the grounds of southwest Charlotte’s Whitehall Corporate Center. When aligned, the individual segments form a giant silver head that spits water from its mouth into a surrounding pool.

Another great way to explore local art is through a neighborhood art walk, designed by the nonprofit, ARTWalks CLT. Take a stroll through NoDa (North Davidson), Charlotte's arts and culture neighborhood, on a 14-stop walk. The tour begins at the iconic “Bloom” mural by Osiris Rain, which features a spray-painted lotus flower symbolizing rebirth. Many other works, like the whimsical freestanding sculpture that doubles as a bike rack, titled “Smelly Cat” by Theron Ross, can also be spotted within a one-block radius.

Or opt for a more high-tech meander with South End Interactive, a collection of ten murals throughout Charlotte's South End neighborhood that all feature QR codes. Simply access the codes with a smartphone camera to learn the stories behind each piece, told by the artists themselves. Featured works include a mural of American inventor Thomas Edison by Lo’Vonia Parks as well as local landmarks like the Bechtler's “Firebird.”

Day 3 - Artist Studios

Located within the city’s Uptown neighborhood, Charlotte’s nationally acclaimed McColl Center is an ideal place for emerging and mid-career artists looking to spur creativity. Along with being a contemporary arts hub, the center offers multi-month residences to artists working across various mediums, providing them with subsidized artist studios, access to equipment and tools such as communal labs for 3D printing, ceramics, and sculpture fabrication, and 5,000 square feet of gallery space to exhibit and sell their work. Artist-in-residences here have included fabric-based sculptor Nicole Havekost and visual artist Mary Valverde, whose works center on the connection between Indigenous and African communities in the Americas.

The Brooklyn Collective

From the late 1800s to the early 1960s, Brooklyn was a predominately Black Charlotte neighborhood that functioned as a city within the city, thriving as its own self-sustainable town. During the 1960s and 1970s, much of the community was razed under the guise of “urban renewal,” displacing thousands of residents and leaving few structures standing. Today, The Brooklyn Collective, a nonprofit dedicated to accelerating inclusivity and economic mobility in Charlotte, operates from three of Brooklyn's remaining historic buildings: the Mecklenburg Investment Company Building (MICo), Studio 229 on Brevard, and the Historic Grace Church. The diverse collective aims to bring back the spirit of Brooklyn through a combination of community, history, and arts. The collective also hosts rotating exhibitions, such as the future-inspired “The Next Hundred Years III,” and provides space for performing arts, resident designers and artists, and even a marketplace.