Foley’s Hot Air Balloon Festival Puts Out a Call for Artists, and It Will Not Accept AI Work

One of South Baldwin County’s signature annual gatherings is looking for the image that will define it. The South Baldwin Chamber of Commerce has issued a formal call for artists to design the official artwork for the 23rd Annual Gulf Coast Hot Air Balloon Festival, to be held in Foley in 2027. The winning design will appear on the festival’s t-shirt and poster, and the chamber has set a firm deadline of Thursday, October 1, 2026.

The Terms of the Competition

Artists may deliver submissions in person to the South Baldwin Chamber of Commerce at 200 N. Alston St., Foley, AL 36535, or mail them to P.O. Box 1117, Foley, AL 36536. Questions and delivery confirmations go to Rachel Spear, Director of Events, at (251) 943-5550 or by email at [email protected].

The design brief is specific. Artwork must engage the festival’s core themes of hot air balloons, art, music and the Gulf Coast. Every submission must incorporate three required text elements:

The words “23rd Annual Gulf Coast Hot Air Balloon Festival”

The year 2027

“Foley, AL”

The finished commissioned poster may not exceed 18 inches wide by 24 inches tall. The selected artist receives a one-time payment of $500 and, in exchange, relinquishes ownership of the work. Upon selection, the design becomes the sole property of the Gulf Coast Hot Air Balloon Festival and the South Baldwin Chamber of Commerce, which may use it as it sees fit without further compensation to the artist.

A Line Drawn on Artificial Intelligence

The most striking element of the call is the chamber’s flat prohibition on machine-generated work. Only original, human-made artwork will be considered. No AI-generated designs will be accepted, full stop.

That stance places the festival among a growing number of arts competitions, festivals and publications that have moved to write explicit human-authorship requirements into their submission rules. Image generation tools have made it trivial to produce a polished, festival-ready poster in minutes, which has forced organizers of small regional competitions into an awkward position: the prize money and the visibility are meant to support working artists in the community, not to reward whoever typed the best prompt. Ruling AI out is the simplest way to keep the commission doing what it was intended to do.

Artists considering a submission should take the requirement at face value. A competition that bothers to write the prohibition into its call is a competition prepared to enforce it.

Weighing the Deal

The commission is a full rights transfer. For $500, the chamber acquires the artwork outright and can reproduce it on merchandise, signage, advertising and promotional material without paying royalties. That is a common arrangement for event artwork, but it is worth understanding clearly before submitting. What the artist gains in return is exposure of a particular kind: the image will be printed on shirts worn across the region, hung in storefronts, and reproduced in festival marketing for a year. For an emerging artist building a regional profile along the Gulf Coast, that reach carries real value.

The Festival Itself

The Gulf Coast Hot Air Balloon Festival has become one of the best-known annual events in South Baldwin County, drawing visitors from across the Gulf Coast region to Foley. It is built around the spectacle of balloons inflating and lifting off at dawn and glowing after dark, but it has grown into a broader celebration of art, music and coastal culture. The 2027 edition marks the 23rd time the community has staged it.

Events of that longevity tend to develop a visual identity, and the annual poster is a large part of how that identity is built and refreshed. Collectors accumulate the shirts. Businesses frame the posters. The image the chamber selects this fall will be the face of the festival for a year.

Next Steps for Interested Artists

Artists across the region are encouraged to submit, and the chamber has framed the call broadly rather than restricting it to Baldwin County residents. Anyone planning to enter should contact the chamber well before the October 1 deadline to confirm delivery requirements and any additional specifications.

For the region’s painters, illustrators and designers, this is a rare, clearly defined commission with a published brief and a real deadline. The work of interpreting a sky full of balloons over Foley is now open.

Foley’s Place on the Festival Calendar

Foley, in South Baldwin County, has cultivated a reputation as a host of family-friendly events, and the Gulf Coast Hot Air Balloon Festival is among its most enduring. Each year the festival draws visitors from across the region to watch balloons inflate at dawn and glow after dark, and it has grown into a broader celebration of art, music, and coastal culture.

The festival’s visual identity is refreshed annually through its official poster and t-shirt artwork, and the commissioned design becomes the face of the event for a full year. Businesses frame the posters, attendees collect the shirts, and the image circulates across the Gulf Coast wherever the festival is promoted.

Why the AI Prohibition Matters

The chamber’s decision to accept only original, human-made artwork, and to bar AI-generated submissions outright, places the competition among a growing number of arts events writing explicit authorship requirements into their rules. As image-generation tools have made polished posters easy to produce quickly, organizers of small regional competitions have faced a choice about whether their prizes should support working artists or merely reward the best prompt.

For the selected artist, the $500 commission carries a full transfer of rights: the chamber may reproduce the work on merchandise, signage, and advertising without further payment. In return, the artist gains regional exposure that is difficult to buy, as the image appears on shirts and posters seen throughout the community for a year. For an emerging painter, illustrator, or designer building a Gulf Coast profile, that visibility has real value.

The call remains open to artists across the region, not only Baldwin County residents, and the chamber has encouraged early contact to confirm delivery requirements before the October deadline.

What Makes a Strong Submission

Past festival posters have leaned heavily on imagery that captures the dawn and twilight moments when hot air balloons are most photogenic. The glowing envelopes lit from within at dusk, the rows of baskets on the launch field at sunrise, and the silhouette of balloons against the Baldwin County sky have all been recurring visual themes. Artists who can capture the warm color palette associated with those moments — oranges, reds, deep blues — tend to produce posters that read clearly on a t-shirt or a banner, even at small sizes.

Because the brief specifies required text elements that must appear on the final piece, the most successful submissions treat the typography as part of the composition rather than as an afterthought. The festival name, the year and the Foley location need to fit within the 18-by-24-inch format without crowding the imagery, and artists who work out those proportions at the sketch stage save themselves revisions later.

How to Get in Touch With the Chamber

The South Baldwin Chamber of Commerce is the operating partner for the festival, and the staff there have fielded similar calls for years. Rachel Spear, the Director of Events, is the primary contact for questions about submission logistics, file specifications and the timeline from selection to print. Artists who want their work reviewed are encouraged to send a brief email describing their practice and providing contact information well before the October 1 deadline, particularly if they intend to mail a physical piece.

The chamber’s office at 200 N. Alston St. in Foley is open during regular business hours, and artists who prefer to deliver work in person can do so there. The mailing address for submissions is P.O. Box 1117, Foley, AL 36536. Either way, the chamber has emphasized that artists should retain copies of their work, since submissions are not returned unless the artist arranges pickup.

Why the Festival Matters to Foley’s Identity

The Gulf Coast Hot Air Balloon Festival is one of a small number of signature events that have shaped Foley’s identity as a destination, alongside the city’s role as an exit on the rapidly growing Baldwin County commuting corridor. Hotels, restaurants and retail businesses along Highway 59 and in the Foley commercial corridor see measurable traffic spikes during festival weekends, and the city’s tourism promotion leans heavily on the event’s image when marketing to potential visitors across the region.

For Foley, the festival also fills a role that purely local events cannot. It draws visitors from Pensacola, Mobile, Montgomery and beyond, and it gives artists, vendors and performers from across the Gulf Coast a reason to spend a weekend in South Baldwin County. The poster artwork that the chamber selects each year is, in a real sense, the city’s invitation to that audience for the following year.