Art All Night decamps to Pittsburgh's North Side this weekend (2025)

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“We follow the empty donated buildings” is the way Art All Night’s Lisa Fuciarelli describes how the folks behind the annual if nomadic weekend-long festival decide where it will live each year.

This year, AAN — in its 28th year — intersects more than ever with the evolving story of redevelopment in Pittsburgh. This Saturday and Sunday, the free, freewheeling and volunteer-run community art showcase will draw thousands to an old North Side warehouse slated for demolition as part of the planned Esplanade development along the Ohio riverfront, just downstream of the West End Bridge.

Art All Night is a signature yearly event on Pittsburgh’s arts calendar. It honors its motto “No Fee, No Jury, No Censorship” by displaying one artwork each from any artist who wants to participate — hundreds each year — no questions asked, and by surrounding those myriad paintings, drawings, sculptures, photographs and installations with live music, snacking options and more.

And yes, it does truly run all night, from 4 p.m. Saturday until 2 p.m. Sunday. Consider dropping by at 3 a.m. just to see who you’ll find perusing the work of both skilled practitioners and passionate amateurs.

While all that still holds true, two big things have changed for 2025. One is AAN’s move to the North Side.

It’s notable because AAN, founded by Lawrenceville residents in the mid-1990s, was for its first two decades reliably staged in that neighborhood. (Old-timers will recall the torrential rains that soaked the 2010 edition, in the old Iron City Brewing complex on Liberty Avenue.)

The map changed in 2018, when AAN hopped the Mon to the South Side before returning to Lawrenceville and the Strip in subsequent years.

Two, if you were among those irritated by the uncharacteristically long lines at AAN last year, fear not. The 2024 edition occupied a still-active Strip District office building that was on the cramped side for all it had to contain. But Fuciarelli said this year’s former produce warehouse is some 50,000 square feet — the usual size for an AAN venue — and entry should be much easier. She promises parking on adjacent lots.

Also, once inside, look out for interior murals, freshly painted by members of Pittsburgh’s graffiti community. And if you’re interested in pre-gaming or after-partying, you’ll be a mile or less from the casino and the North Shore’s bars and restaurants.

And you won’t be alone. Fuciarelli, in her first year as the event’s director — or “Grand Poobah,” as they say at AAN — says last year’s event hosted an estimated 10,000 visitors or more to see work by nearly 1,000 artists. (Not forgetting the event’s 50-member planning committee, or the hundreds of event-day volunteers who make it all work.)

AAN still uses Lawrenceville’s landmark Doughboy statue as its symbol. But remember that that neighborhood looked very different 20 years ago, before gentrification took hold. It was relatively easy to find big underutilized warehouses and other such complexes. No longer so.

Which brings us back to redevelopment. AAN attendees will be visiting a section of the sprawling riverfront neighborhood known as Chateau that’s populated mostly by other light-industrial or commercial buildings. It’s on the verge of big changes, as Pittsburgh-based Piatt Companies moves ahead with a $740 million plan to remake the 15-acre site with apartment buildings, retail and even a Ferris wheel. Site preparation and building design are slated to begin this year.

So this “empty donated building” likely won’t be an option for Art All Night even as soon as next year. As Fuciarelli says, “It’s a chance to come see the inside of something that’s not going to be there soon.”