By Chip Chandler — Digital Content Producer
The organizers of the All Things Artful art festival take its name seriously: Everything from pottery to culinary arts will be celebrated.
The annual festival — which raises funds for Amarillo Art Institute — is set for 5 to 8 p.m. Saturday at the institute, located at the Galleries at Sunset Center, 3701 Plains Blvd.
"It truly is all things artful," said Rachel Flores, the institute's director.
Among the featured arts:
- A student exhibition showcasing works by students from AAI and Eastridge Elementary School
- Arts vendors selling jewelry, leather goods, paintings and claywork
- Handmade items like soaps
- Food from 575 Pizzeria, Sharky's Burrito Co. and Tyler's Barbecue
- Craft beer and wine, and more
Seven artists will take part in in a "quick draw" competition — drawing, painting or weaving a new creation within an hour. And all attendees will receive a clay bowl crafted by Alex Gregory that will be filled with homemade ice cream.
"We'll do some interactive art activities, too," Flores said. "We want people to get to come enjoy art, do art and buy art."
Denton-based skunkgrass band Boxcar Bandits, featuring Amarillo native Rex Emerson, will perform.
The event will be dedicated to the late Ann Crouch, an artist and arts patron who died in January. She converted the old Sunset Center Mall into a thriving collection of galleries, and she founded the institute.
"She was an incredible abstract artist. Pretty much every one of her paintings had bright, bold colors in them, and she would often talk about that as the whole reason for her to create — to do things bold and bright and lively," Flores said.
To that end, the quick draw competitors will make kaleidoscope-themed works, creating what Flores called "a festival of color."
Chip Chandler is a digital content producer for Panhandle PBS. He can be contacted at Chip.Chandler@actx.edu, at @chipchandler1 on Twitter and on Facebook.
