If a picture is worth a thousand words, imagine what meaning it could acquire if painted during a break dance performance – before a live audience. Attendees at the 44th annual Upper Arlington Labor Day Arts Festival (www.ua-ohio.net) will experience this firsthand during Transit Arts’ 3 p.m. performance on Sept. 6 on the Main Stage.
Transit Arts (www.transitarts.com), a youth arts development program based in Columbus’ seven settlement houses, is just one of many performance groups that will participate in the festival.
Additional performance groups include the Upper Arlington High School Marching Band, Shaw Brothers and Mojoflo. As in previous years, the festival will also welcome visual artists. This year 368 applications were received for the nearly 200 spots at the festival.
“I’m a big fan,” says Lauren Emond, community arts coordinator of Transit Arts. “I’ve seen them around town, and they are always a group that really adds a lot of excitement wherever they are.”
Perhaps the excitement is a result of the group’s various art forms, which include live music, dance and disc jockeying in the genres of hip-hop, rap and R&B. Performances often involve poetry readings and live painting, as well.
“A couple years ago, our artists decided to start painting during a performance,” says Jackie Calderone, director of Transit Arts. “They will set up their easels and they will just be painting anything that comes to them. They’ll be inspired by the performances, by the environments.”
The performers create a lively environment by encouraging audience participation. They prefer that audience members “not sit there and be polite, but really get engaged,” Calderone says.
This “get involved” mentality seems to fit the atmosphere of the festival, as attendees are encouraged to do more than just look and listen. At the Arts Activities Area Stage, they can participate in a Laughter Yoga Workshop, an Open Poetry Slam and more. Nearby, in the Arts Activity Area, festival goers can get creative by making art t-shirts, cardboard guitars, glass beads, paper lanterns and a variety of other artistic projects.
For Transit Arts, participating in festivals is about more than just sharing art with the community. It is also about creating ties that could benefit the youth involved. “We try to do things both in the central city and then in the suburbs periodically,” Calderone says. “It exposes our young people to other resources.”
Because the program encourages development and ongoing involvement, many participants eventually teach for the program or return as guest performers. “We really like to encourage artists to expand their horizons,” she says. “I’m excited about this relationship with Upper Arlington.”
Krista Henneck is a contributing writer for Tri-Village Magazine.