The Columbus Arts Festival encourages public appreciation of the arts and culture by providing a high quality arts festival for the community featuring visual artists, musical performers and hands-on arts activities.

About the 2007 Festival

More than 400,000 people visited the downtown riverfront June 7-10 to enjoy the 46th annual Columbus Arts Festival presented by Chase. Hundreds of artists, corporate partners and volunteers worked together to host another successful Festival.

Festival preparation moved into high gear during the first week in January with the receipt of over 1,200 artist applications. A jury panel of five artisans of various backgrounds narrowed the field to the 240 artists selected to participate in the Festival in June. Additionally, 20 percent of last year’s artists were automatically invited back through the on-site jury process.

Community support of the Columbus Arts Festival is tremendous. The generous and continued corporate support of Chase enabled the Festival to bring high quality artists to Columbus at a reasonable cost. Media support from NBC 4 and Time Warner Cable was key to the exposure and support that is necessary in offering this nationally acclaimed festival to central Ohio. The Other Paper continued its support of the Festival by creating and printing the annual Festival Guidebook. The Children’s Area in 2007 was presented by Giant Eagle, and offered face painting to children as they created their own masterpieces. Ohio Magazine supported the Poetry Corner. For the third year, the Salon Schools Group sponsored the Pocket Maps. Bud Light, GEICO, Sunshine Vacations, City of Columbus 2012, Columbus City Center and Westin Great Southern Hotel also joined as partners for the Festival, offering samples of their products.

SWACO and the Columbus Arts Festival continued their partnership in producing a green event, with increased recycling opportunities for patrons. During the 2007 Columbus Arts Festival, patrons filled a 30-yard dumpster with plastic bottles to send to recycling. This was an 80 percent increase from 2006. The second annual “Trash to Treasure Artist Award” was presented to Kerry Christian for his use of found objects in his artwork. SWACO also presented “Recycling at the Festival” on Friday, June 8. SWACO team members rewarded patrons “caught” recycling with bags made of recycled milk jugs. Finally, the Festival partnered with the Mayor’s Pedal Instead program to provide an area for cyclists to park their bikes during their visit to the Festival.

More than 65 musical acts performed on the Bicentennial and Broad Street Club stages. Acts ranged from traditional jazz to rock to world music. In its fourth year, the Broad Street Club stage has become a popular destination for those who prefer to enjoy live music in a more intimate, music club atmosphere. On Friday, Bicentennial Park was filled to capacity with families enjoying the evening with one of Columbus’ greatest artistic organizations – the Columbus Jazz Orchestra. Saturday and Sunday featured numerous local performance groups on the Community Stage.

Saturday and Sunday also featured hands-on arts activities for both children and adults. In the Cultural Arts Center’s courtyard, children created masterpieces of their own with help from the Columbus College of Art and Design and the James Cancer Hospital & Solov Research Institute. The Adult Art Activities area, located on a street adjacent to the Children’s Area, offered adults the opportunity to work on a potter’s wheel, construct a poem and to learn the fine art of creating Ikebana – a Japanese style of flower arrangement. The local arts organizations involved in these activities provided an introductory experience to the arts for all ages and access to excellent resources in Columbus.

The Ohio Magazine Poetry Corner, a tent and stage offering a coffeehouse atmosphere dedicated to the art of the spoken word, featured readers who auditioned in front of a jury of accomplished local poets and educators in March. Last year was one of the most competitive to date for auditions. One of the most popular events at the Poetry Corner was the third annual Columbus Arts Festival Poetry Slam, featuring 10 of Columbus’ finest slam poets. Student poets were featured on Sunday afternoon of the festival. These award-winning students were chosen through their respective school’s contest, which a member of the festival poetry committee helped to organize.