Arts Festival celebrates 30th year

EDMOND — It’s time to “Celebrate the Arts” with the 30th annual Downtown Edmond Arts Festival, which will offer several new experiences this year, from 10 a.m. to 8 p.m. Friday and Saturday and from 11 a.m. to 5 p.m. Sunday.

The Downtown Edmond Business Association, which began the festival 30 years ago, has worked throughout the year to plan the event. Each year the event grows and hits record attendance numbers, including last year’s record of about 75,000 people.

More art offered

Leah Kessler, DEBA manager, said the major addition this year is the extension of artists’ booths on First Street going west all the way to the railroad tracks. Last year, they extended only to the alley west of Broadway. Kessler said there will be 110 artists this year compared to the 98-100 they normally have.

“We are encompassing the entire Festival Market Place,” Kessler said.

Professor Bob Palmer, art professor at the University of Central Oklahoma, will be returning as the featured artist. Last year, he painted a mural on the Weathers TV building, while his students painted murals on the backs of several stores on the west side of Broadway.

This year Palmer will introduce a new technique he has created.

“I’ve developed this painting process where I used Oklahoma red dirt in my paintings,” he said. “I’ve lived in Oklahoma and often thought this would be something fun to play with.”

He said he either uses it to mix with his paints to create a unique texture or uses it raw for color and applies it using a gel medium. Palmer said there are some subjects that lend themselves to the terra-cotta red of the dirt, including rust-covered subjects or a Western wagon.

“It’s a real warm, orangy color, especially if you’re using a lot of cool colors around it,” he said. “I like to use it for sky.”

Palmer will be demonstrating this technique on a painting that he will begin Friday. He said he probably will start the red dirt process Saturday.

“Unity,” an original painting he already has finished using this new technique, will be for sale for about $750.

“He got the inspiration from the arts festival because it’s our 30th year and he felt an organization that has done this for 30 years must have unity,” Kessler said.

Palmer said the painting depicts three boys who appear to have just finished playing in a ball game.

“I’ve applied it to the surface so it looks like they’ve played in the dirt,” he said. “It’s an additive to the color.”

Other booths will offer a variety of art media, including watercolor, oil painting, acrylic painting, sculpture, photography and jewelry.

Entertainment grows

Kessler said they not only will offer more artists, but also more entertainment than last year. DEBA has added a stage in the Festival Market Place to create “Music on the Plaza.”

“We have 25 performances throughout the weekend,” she said.

She said regulars will return, including Inkapirka, a Latin American Folk group that has traveled for the event for the past nine years from their home state of Wisconsin. Blue Condition, a band from Dallas, will make their debut at the festival this year.

Kessler said tables will be set up near the stage so people can eat and be entertained at the same time. There also will be a tip jar to show appreciation for the performers, who have volunteered.

Old and new food

Danny Marx, vendor chairman, said there will about 20 food vendors, including old favorites like Indian tacos, Cajun catfish, funnel cakes and turkey legs. He said one new vendor will offer Southern fried fruit and meat pies.

Wine tastings will be offered by Oklahoma vineyards at the intersections of Broadway and First Street and Broadway and Main Street.

Marx has volunteered at the arts festival for 15 years and said it definitely has evolved.

“The streetscape has entirely changed,” he said.

Marx said the event’s efficiency also has increased since so many of the volunteers are long time Arts Festival veterans.

Sand art offered

Even the Children’s Tent, which for the second consecutive year will be located at Festival Market Place, will offer something new.

Jessica Crow, children’s chairwoman for the festival, said sand art will be making a comeback after not being offered at the festival for about the past four years. She said they will also have inflatable games, a Ferris wheel, crafts, face painting, tattoos and balloon animals.

Crow said they try to offer only hands-on crafts that encourage the children to use thinking skills.

“If you involve them at that age, they are way more involved when they get older,” she said. “Doing things in the community keeps them in the community.”

Volunteers needed

About 110 people have signed up to volunteer at the Edmond Arts Festival and about 25 more are needed, particularly for afternoon and night shifts on Saturday. For more information about volunteering, call Stephanie Carrel at 285-9700.

READ Friday’s Edmond Sun to learn more about the charity benefiting from the Downtown Edmond Arts Festival raffle sales.

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