How We Created a Video Series for Arts Landing
Here’s how we collaborated with the Pittsburgh Cultural Trust to create a video series featuring interviews with ten artists.
Image of the Pittsburgh Cultural Trust’s Instagram, featuring videos from the Arts Landing interview series.
Introduction
Client
Pittsburgh Cultural Trust
Industry
Nonprofits and Arts
Services
Videography, interviewing, video editing, audio engineering, music composition, and audio mixing and mastering
Arts Landing is a new four-acre outdoor civic space envisioned by the Pittsburgh Cultural Trust and designed by landscape architecture firm Field Operations. It stretches from 7th to 9th street and Penn Avenue to Ft. Duquesne Blvd. in downtown Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. There will be a bandshell, recreation space, and new public artworks by ten artists.
Arts Landing launches in 2026 and is the inaugural public art program of the Pittsburgh Cultural Trust. The debut exhibition will feature newly commissioned pieces by nine artists with deep ties to the city, presented alongside an exhibition of eight bronze sculptures by acclaimed sculptor Thaddeus Mosley, organized in collaboration with Public Art Fund.
As part of the announcement for Arts Landing, the Pittsburgh Cultural Trust contacted Bright Archives to produce a series of video interviews with the participating artists. Intended for a general audience, the videos needed to introduce Arts Landing while providing space for the artists to share their artistic practice.
Primary Goal
Pittsburgh Cultural Trust needed professionally produced videos that allow the artists to share the stories behind their sculptures.
Our Solution
Bright Archives produced eight short videos where each artist or artist team would describe their projects. We also produced three compilation videos focused on specific themes.
Pittsburgh Cultural Trust provided requirements for the number and types of videos, and they organized the filming location and artist schedules. Filming took place across multiple sessions and coincided with portrait photography by photographer Michael Parente.
Video still of artist Vanessa German.
Bright Archives developed interview questions, conducted the artist interviews, and provided videography and audio recording services.
After the filming sessions, we started post-production, including editing, mixing, and mastering. When editing the interviews, we focused on preserving the artists’ intentions while limiting the length of each video to under 80 seconds. Our work also included animation title and closing sequences.
The filming location presented several challenges and the project required additional audio noise reduction. We processed the interview audio through multiple layers of noise reduction to remove environmental sounds.
The Results
Pittsburgh Cultural Trust published the videos through social media, and the compilation videos have been used for internal projects and presentations. Each of the public-facing videos have received thousands of views, and the interview with artist Thaddeus Mosley has been viewed over 12,000 times.
Conclusion
A key takeaway from this case is the importance of balancing depth with a concise narrative in video production, especially in short-form videos. Despite the brevity of each final video—80 seconds—we took the time during pre-production and filming to develop thoughtful interview questions and allow the artists to tell their stories and explore their practice. This lead to rich content and a comfortable interview experience for the artists, which comes through in the final result.
We want to extend our gratitude to the artists and Pittsburgh Cultural Trust for partnering with us on this project. It was a pleasure working with the entire team.
If you find yourself in the Pittsburgh region sometime during or after summer 2026, we encourage you to visit Arts Landing in downtown to see the sculptures.
