​Let’s give them something to chalk about

“We had 450 people the first year, 1,000 the second when we moved it to Island Park, and more than 3,000 last year when we moved it to the Red River Zoo.” says Dayna Del Val, Executive Director of The Arts Partnership. According to The Arts Partnership’s website, “ChalkFest 2015 was the largest art-making event in our community’s history.” They are anticipating nearly twice as many attendees at this year’s event.

2016 marks the fourth year for Chalkfest. Chalkfest originally started on the green space and surrounding sidewalks in front of The Great Northern Bike shop Downtown on Broadway. It has since moved to Island Park and now to its current home, the Red River Zoo.

Chalkfest attendees can anticipate free admission to the zoo, live music with Save me CJ, chalking spaces for all ages and all abilities, as well as zoo demonstrations, food vendors, artist demonstrations, and free chalk for all.

High Plains Reader had the opportunity to chat with Del Val and see what everybody’s chalking about.

High Plains Reader: How did chalkfest originally come about?

Dayna Del Val: I had a fabulous young intern, Anjali Lall, the summer of 2013. I asked her to create an event that might engage her peers. She had just graduated from Davies High School, and she had participated in a chalk festival there that had been a lot of fun. She created the entire event for The Arts Partnership. Tragically, Anjali passed away in 2014, so this event holds even more meaning for me since we now do it in her memory. She would be so thrilled to see this incredible growth and enthusiasm for the event.

HPR: Last year it rained during Chalkfest--how did that affect the festival? Do you have an alternate plan if it does rain?

DD:It did rain…and no one melted! MeLissa Kossick, my communications coordinator, and I anguished about whether or not to move the event to the next day when we saw the forecast, but ultimately, we decided that too much advertising had been put into the day of and went ahead. As I said, with pretty awful weather, we still had 3,000 people in attendance. We rented tents for the bands and sound equipment, and ultimately, it was a super fun experience to be out at the zoo in the rain with thousands of our closest friends!

HPR: How did you find Marcus Dunn? His work is stunning! Do you generally have a featured artist or is this a new facet to the event?

DD: TAP board member Jeff Knight attended SCAD for his masters degree and started talking about their annual chalk festival when we were planning ours last year. Theirs has over 35,000 people who come to enjoy the day. I looked up this year’s individual artist winner and just contacted him through Facebook to see if he would have any interest in coming to be our featured artist. He said yes, and the rest is history. I should note that Arctic Audio/Rod and Ellen Shafer are sponsoring his flight and his sleeping arrangements while he is here.

HPR: Who are the artists participating--and who are the arts organizations involved?

DD: Tracy Melendez, Magda Szeitz, Kaija Thorson, Olivia Bain, Cathi Koenig, Brandon LaPlante, Alissa Allery, Kim Jore, Nate Stensgard, Sabrina Hornung. Right now, participating organizations are FMCT, the FMVA, the FM Opera, Streets Alive Plains Art Museum.

HPR: How did you seek out the participating artists?

DD: MeLissa just used her fabulous reach and sent out a call to area artists. We were thrilled with the response and even ended up with a waiting list. This is the first year we have used local artists in this way, and we are so happy to be able to provide them this great big audience to watch them create. It will be a wonderful introduction to the event for audiences, too, since they will be drawing on the sidewalks immediately outside the entrance to the Zoo.

HPR: Where can we anticipate seeing more of Marcus Dunn's work around town?

DD: He will be drawing at the McDonald’s parking lots on Main Avenue in Fargo and in West Fargo as well as the downtown Gate City Bank location and at Arctic Audio. We are still putting together the schedule, but check our website for more information as we get closer.

IF YOU GO:

The Arts Partnership presents Chalkfest at the zoo

Thursday, August 11, 1pm-8pm

The Red River Zoo, 4255 23rd Ave. South, Fargo

http://theartspartnership.net/chalkfest/