Beneath the hundreds of strands of twinkling lights that dotted Government Street on Friday, the Baton Rouge community came together for an evening of local music, food and art at the 19th annual White Light Night.
Hosted by Mid City Merchants, an association of mostly local business owners and organizations, White Light Night grows bigger each year. Attendees strolled up and down Government Street as various art vendor booths, food tents and live performers lined the road.
One of the city’s premier art and antique shops, The Market at Circa 1857, had one of the largest crowds of the night.
University printmaking juniors Mariel Gates and Hannah Cox had a vendor booth outside the Market. Within the culture of printmaking, there’s an emphasis on exchange, Gates said.

“A lot of artists work in solitude,” Gates said, “so to have an event like this for them not only to present their work, which is very intimate. But also to engage with the community and talk about other work, I think, can give you a perspective on your own work, and you can grow from having a show like this.”
The experimentation and freedom to take a simple drawing and turn it into a multi-dimensional piece of art is what led Gates to printmaking, while for Cox, it was the scientific, intricate processes of the physical art.
Figuring out how to market their work for themselves while still students and forming relationships with other artists in the community is important to navigating the scene as an independent printmaker, Cox said.
“When you actually [have a show], you realize how much it takes to do this, and it gives you a lot more respect,” Cox said.
Gates and Cox are the last students who will be able to graduate with a degree in printmaking. The School of Art, within the College of Art and Design offers a Bachelor’s Degree of Fine Arts in Studio Art, with a handful of concentrations that students can focus in, including printmaking.
As part of the “last generation” of printmaking majors, the two said incoming students won’t have the advantage of having their specialty listed on their degree.
“I feel like it’s important to do this in school, especially as an artist, because you don’t want to get out of school and be like, ‘Woah, how do I do all of this,’” Cox said.
Baton Rouge native Leah Messer is the owner of Teragram Designs, a handmade jewelry business. Messer has been making and selling jewelry for two and a half years. Local boutique Merci Beaucoup carries Messer’s products, and she also sells them through her business Instagram page, in addition to wholesaling certain pieces to retail stores around the country.
Messer said before she started showing her work at White Light Night, it was her favorite night of the year.
“I feel like there’s so many people who don’t have a space to put their things out there or who don’t have a place to speak, share their voice, share their art, share their creativity,” Messer said. “Things like this give so many people in the community a chance to put it out there, and even if it doesn’t sell, the point isn’t necessarily to make money. It’s to put yourself out there, put your things out there and let people see it for what it is.”
University alumna Emily McCollister is involved with the local arts scene as a booking agent for The Parlor, a creative workspace and music venue, and works for the Arts Council of Greater Baton Rouge.
McCollister said while White Light Night isn’t a total problem solver for the lack of artistic interest in the city, it’s a good place to start. Baton Rouge has artistic talent, but a lack of support can be seen sheerly in attendance numbers, she said. Without people to support it, the local creative community can’t grow.
“The goal is that you can expose people to art and say ‘Okay, look at all the cool things that are happening in our city. There’s local art. There’s makers. There’s music — original, good, local music — and it happens all the time. It doesn’t just happen once a year or at Ogden Park Prowl. … It’s happening all the time.”
Because Baton Rouge is between New Orleans and Lafayette, cities with very defined cultures, some may think this doesn’t give the city an opportunity to develop its own culture. Those in the arts scene right now are defining the city’s culture, McCollister said.
“It’s important to have people rally in one central location to peak the mass interest of the community in hopes of those long term supporters,” she said. “But if there’s no longevity, long-term sustainability … that’s not a long-term investment in the artistic community.”