AKFA_PressRelease - venice street art festival

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE
PRESS CONTACT: Kim Sharp, Abbot Kinney Festival 310-904-9736
Gary Palmer, Street Art Projects 310-463-2432
Abbot Kinney Festival Association announces the collaboration with
Street Art Projects at the 2015 Abbot Kinney Festival
Street Art Projects joins the Abbot Kinney Festival for the 2nd year
to produce a chalk art festival, Venice Street Art Festival, on Westminster Avenue at Abbot
Kinney Boulevard.
Street Art Projects, a grassroots venice-based initiative for art in public places, was founded in
2010 by internationally renowned street-painter, Gary Palmer, and last year joined by local
creative activist and event organizer, Rob Dew, to co-produce the first Venice Street Art Festival.
Street Art Festival is a contemporary version of the historic Italian tradition of the 'Madonnari',
traveling artists who rendered the great masterworks of the renaissance on city streets. Rather
than renditions of old masters, today's artists create original works in the ephemeral medium of
chalk. A professional featured artist will create a large scale 3D anamorphic perspective
painting, alongside a grid of squares where local artists work on paintings of their own
invention, revealing the process of creation while talking to people passing by. The other
highlight of the festival is a community section in which children from local schools collaborate
on a large-scale mandala. Stephanie Lowe, Art teacher at Animo school, and Ava Kasrabod,
( of the much loved Vardo Gypsy Cafe) coordinate the colorful community area, allowing
passers by not just to interact but also to take part by engaging in the creative process.
This years event promises some new elements to reflect the breadth of creativity we might
expect from the wide-minded artistic community in Venice. The festival is made possible with
funding from local business so this year we will be hoping to expand the list of sponsors. Last
years event was kindly supported by Casa Linda, Abbots Habit, Yas, Lemonade, Hawaiian Gun
Rack, Cairo Cowboy, Fruit Gallery, Mittels, Google, Otis School of Art and Design, Animo,
Westminster Elementary, Claire Fontaine, Nancy Pittenger, and local favorite, Hals Bar and Grill.
Citizens of Venice, and further afield, are invited to enjoy the spectacle equipped with phone
and camera, take pictures, and talk to the artists as they reveal the process of their work. While
the paintings themselves wash away in the elements, footprints of the works are sent from
friend to friend across the world by the vehicle of social media as technology and hand-made
ephemeral art collide.
STREET ART PROJECTS
361Vernon Ave, studio 6
Venice, CA 90291
Gary Palmer | 310 463 2432
www.streetartprojects.blogspot.com
https://www.facebook.com/www.streetartprojects.org