Word of the month: Spoleto.

There are two festivals running from Friday, May 26 to Sunday, June 11 to fill up your calendar: Piccolo Spoleto and Spoleto Festival USA.

Spoleto Festival USA | The essence of Spoleto is days and nights filled with live performances from international artists and performers. The festival was founded in 1977 and has a mission to display emerging artists.
Piccolo Spoleto | The parallel festival began in 1979 and focuses on showing off local and regional artists. Events for Piccolo are put on by the City of Charleston.

Piccolo Spoleto kicks off Friday, May 26 to highlight local artists in the Lowcountry. We are excited to shine a light on some of the artists we had the pleasure of chatting with.

Local artist Laurie Meyer in her element teaching a Plein Air painting class. | Photo by CHStoday team

Laurie Meyer is part owner of the Meyer Vogl gallery, a previous Piccolo first place winner, well-known artist, and teacher of many of the Piccolo artists.

She walked us around her painting class this month in the Old Village and was able to introduce us to her world of art in the Holy City.

Meet Cynthia Houston, who is being welcomed back to her third year in the festival. Cynthia will be selling paintings at the Outdoor Art Exhibition.

Cynthia Huston working on her painting of the Post House Inn. | Photo by CHStoday team

Cynthia and Laurie's connection formed years ago when Cynthia approached Laurie at the festival to chat about painting. Today, they are painting buddies and Cynthia holds her own place in the festival.

Laurie has been teaching classes for about 15 years and has a long waiting list for students to join her crew. Cynthia was persistent to work with Laurie and now they meet twice a week to paint. Try this:Chat with your favorite artist at Piccolo.

Here are some of the most exciting events of Piccolo 2023:

Outdoor art exhibition
Craft show
Celebrating Black Mermaids From Africa to America

Let us know which events you are planning to attend.