Art on the Green returns next weekend

COEUR d'ALENE — Kids of all ages, get your art-loving boots on because it's time for Coeur d'Alene's largest celebration of beautiful objects of every kind.

Art on the Green, in its 55th year, will take over the North Idaho College campus with more than 120 artist booths Aug. 4, 5 and 6.

"It's super awesome," Citizens' Council for the Arts President Diane Solomon said Wednesday. "We’re just all super thrilled we’ve been able to keep it going."

This year, Solomon said Art on the Green will be all about the kids.

"We're really trying to show kids we love kids and we want them to experience some of the arts," she said.

Many of the festival's family-friendly activities will be geared toward engaging youths with different artists and mediums.

The South Stage will feature the Sorensen Drummers Workshop from noon to 12:45 Friday, where children will have opportunities to learn percussion and drumming. They will also be introduced to classical music through the Music Conservatory of Coeur d'Alene's flute workshop directly following the percussion session. Other interactive activities and performances featuring storytelling, theater arts and highland dancing will take place throughout the weekend.

For the first time, Citizens' Council for the Arts, the nonprofit organizer of the event, has sponsored a student-juried art show open to local high schoolers. Solomon said 80 student pieces were submitted, 39 passingthe first round of judging.

"We’re planning for space in the juried show tent to hang their pieces," she said.

The winner of this year's Art on the Green Poster Contest is Brittany Groves, who works as a respiratory therapist at Sacred Heart Medical Center in Spokane. Her winning entry is a watercolor and ink piece with two friendly foxes out for a hike in the woods, stopping to take in the scenery.

"I feel really grateful it was selected," Groves said. "I was not expecting anything like that at all. This was my first time entering a contest like this."

Groves submitted two pieces with foxes that showcase the subtle humor she adds to all of her artwork.

"I just felt like that would be a little humorous and something different than people have submitted before," Groves said. "I like to do animals in my doodles and illustrations. I like to give them a human quality to make things fun."

Solomon said the 2023 Art on the Green is going green.

"We are not doing soda or water in plastic bottles this year," she said. "We have gone back to aluminum. The kids of the parents who work with us, that's something they all talk about. The kids are greatly concerned about what’s happening to our planet. At least with cans we can recycle."

Festival hours:

Aug. 4: 11 a.m. to 7:30 p.m.

Aug. 5: 10 a.m. to 7:30 p.m.

Aug. 6: 10 a.m. to 4 p.m.

Entertainment will go until 8 p.m. Aug. 4 and 5. Food service and ice cream will start serving at 11 a.m. each day.

Solomon, who has been involved with Art on the Green for more than 40 years, said this festival is all about community.

"It’s about celebrating the arts we have within our own community, giving those people a platform to present their wares and all of us coming together to enjoy that, be it sculpting, music, painting or something else," she said.

A beer and wine garden will be open for those 21 and older all weekend.

Citizens' Council for the Arts volunteers work an estimated 5,000 hours during the year planning the long-running art festival. More than 300 volunteers will contribute their time and talents to food services, the children’s art garden area, juried shows, information booth, entertainment team, grounds crews and beer and wine garden.

Art on the Green profits will help provide art supplies to local schools. The Citizens' Council for the Arts has donated over $38,000 in the past four years in art supplies, selected by teachers and delivered by volunteers.

Info: artonthegreen.org