If you’re just tuning into what we do here in Laguna Beach, I can tell you that we’re about a LOT of art, ahem. We started as an Art Colony, and our summer and winter art festivals are some of the most renowned in the world.
We’ve been doing the one-of-a-kind Laguna Beach Pageant of the Masters for about 75 years. (This year’s Only Make Believe runs July 7 – Aug 31.)
Our resident-artist-only art festival extravaganza, the Laguna Beach Sawdust Art Festival is a great way to spend a fun afternoon. (Remember, residents get in free Thursday evenings and the first Friday of each month.)
We have the Art-A-Fair next to the Sawdust grounds. And then we have the Laguna Beach Festival of Arts display on the Pageant grounds (June 30 – Aug 31), which features premier artists from all over Southern California.
It was great being invited to the Festival of Arts Opening Night – it’s a great party with a ton of people and a lot of happy artists (140 this year!). But it’s just no way to really SEE the art; it’s a mob scene in there.
[singlepic id=355 w=320 h=240 mode=watermark float=right]So, I discovered that the Festival of Arts offers FREE Doecnt Tours of all the artwork, Monday through Friday at 11:00 a.m., and on every weekday but Monday, again from 3:00 – 4:00 p.m. On Saturday, there’s one art tour at 4:00.
What a great idea and what a great way to see the Festival of Arts! So, a couple weeks ago, I gathered up a posse of friends and we all headed down for our free tour. (Getting into the Festival grounds is free for Laguna Beach residents, military personnel and children under 12. It’s $4 for students and seniors, and just $7 for adults who can’t claim LB residency.)
We met up with a lovely lady, Sydelle, at the Information Booth, and she was off and trotting in seconds with her brood waddling behind her. In one short hour, she showed us around to about 75% of the booths, offering tidbit stories; information on medium and original artist style; and all sorts of interesting facts and factoids about the artists that you’d rarely learn even in talking to the artist personally.
Seriously, where else could you possibly learn that . .
- Raymond Caruso, the scrimshaw artist, only carves from naturally shed walrus tusk
- Jeweler Gretchen Shields eschewed traditional jewel display boxes to box and house her big, bold jewelry in MUCH more interesting fashion …
- Noriho Uriu is known as the “suicide artist” because …
- Shelley Rapp Evans has carried the centuries-old tradition of “Spirit Keepers” into her popular work …
- Rick Graves devised his own camera to preserve the images he finds …
- Ceramic renown Marlo Bartels knew he wanted to be in ceramics while still in high school, so he traced ceramics back to its origination and took off for the Middle East to live there, exploring every facet and factory he could find …
- Popular artist Ken Auster uses his hands and fingertips to paint everything he produces except …
- John Taylor produces his magnificent 3-dimensional ships from tiny pieces of refuse he finds …
- Rose Hammer taught herself how to make exquisite baskets out of nothing but pine needles …
© Diane Armitage, 2011, LagunaBeachBest.com