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April Issue 2007
The First Columbia Festival of the Arts Kicks off in Columbia, SC, Apr. 26 - May 6, 2007
The first Columbia Festival of the Arts, celebrating the arts community in the greater Columbia, SC, area begins on Apr. 26 and continues through May 6, 2007. The Festival is going to be 11 days of making a community feel good about itself and the amazing arts it has to offer.
In Columbia, there is an arts community that cities twice the size would do anything to have. Still, many citizens of Columbia feel that the best feature of their home is that it has a major university, or that it is only two hours from the coast or the mountains. Co-Chair of the festival, Marvin Chernoff sums up this inherent inferiority complex, "People don't appreciate what we have here" he says.
The goal of the Columbia Festival of the Arts is to change that mindset of these people as well as to make the people of surrounding areas realize that Columbia is a destination for great art and culture. During the festival, there will be performances and exhibits from just about every realm of the art world.
The Festival starts off with the annual Artista Vista, a gallery walk and sale of fine art in the historic congaree vista area of Columbia with Art Night on Apr. 26, from 5-9pm and continuing on Saturday, Apr. 28, 2007, with Art Day, from 11am-5pm. The art galleries and other businesses of the Vista will present art exhibitions featuring some of the finest artists from the region and beyond. Apr. 28, is also the same day of the 4th annual SC State Museum's Congaree Arts Festival, held from 9am-5pm. This festival features some of SC's best studio artists, presenting works of art and art demonstrations.
The visual arts components of the Columbia
Festival of the Arts continue with art openings throughout
the week of exhibitions at gallery venues, commercial and institutional,
all over Columbia, in addition to world-class exhibitions at the
South Carolina State Museum and the Columbia Art Museum of Art.
The visual arts offerings finish with the first Columbia Open
Studios 2007 tour, a two day tour of working artists studios
in Richland and Lexington counties which will get people familiar
with artists who are already known in places like New York and
Los Angeles. This event features the studios of more than 60 artists
and will take place on May 5, from 10am-6pm and May 6, from noon-6pm.
You can get a copy of the tour publication, including a list of
the participating artists, images of their work, maps and directions,
by calling 803/233-2345 or by e-mailing (sarah.waldman@cnsg.com).
Two of the theatres in town, Trustus and Workshop Theatre, will have openings of great performances. The Town Theatre, the oldest continuously running community theatre in the country, will be performing the Broadway favorite Cats for the first time in the state by a community theatre. Each of the city's dance companies, Columbia City Ballet and Columbia City Jazz, will have special performances, as well as the University dance company's performance of a beloved Martha Graham piece.
In addition to these performances, a great family event at EdVenture Children's Museum is planned. There will also be an exciting Cinco De Mayo Celebration hosted by Hispanic Connections in Finlay Park.
There are several other events as well, from
Jazz in the award winning Riverbanks Botanical Gardens to a Film
Crawl down the historic Main Street of Columbia. In addition,
the festival will produce several events to wake up the residents
of this town.
The greats of Columbia's arts history will be honored at the induction
of the Columbia Arts Hall of Fame, and then a celebration will
ensue to kick off the opening of the festivities. In the middle
of the week, a free concert of area musicians will give the residents
of Columbia something to clap their hands about.
Finally, as is only appropriate, the festival will close with a free outdoor concert at Finlay Park. The South Carolina Philharmonic, as well as the Benedict Choir will perform and amaze the crowd with a stunning fireworks finale.
Once the light from the fireworks has died and the visitors and residents of Columbia go back to their respective homes, Chernoff hopes they will realize Columbia is an oasis of arts and culture.
For complete details visit (www.columbiafestivalofthearts.com).
Carolina Arts is published monthly by Shoestring Publishing
Company, a subsidiary of PSMG, Inc.
Copyright© 2007 by PSMG, Inc., which published Charleston
Arts from July 1987 - Dec. 1994 and South Carolina Arts
from Jan. 1995 - Dec. 1996. It also publishes Carolina Arts
Online, Copyright© 2007 by PSMG, Inc. All rights reserved
by PSMG, Inc. or by the authors of articles. Reproduction or use
without written permission is strictly prohibited. Carolina
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