07-29-10 SBMA’s 4th Annual Festival of Banners Decorates Downtown with Heartfelt Artistic Expression

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v � d PRACF. � �e . 1865 SBM South Bend Museum of Art MEDIA RELEASE Thursday, July 29, 2010 11:00 AM Contact: Mikki Dobski, Dir. of Communications & Special Projects, 235 -5855 or 876 -1564 Candie Waterloo, Festival Coordinator, SBMA, 235 -9102 Marco Mariani, Director, Downtown South Bend, Inc., 282 -1110 SBMA's 4th Annual Festival of Banners Decorates Downtown with Heartfelt Artistic Expression This summer, the streets of downtown South Bend will again showcase the Festival of Banners 2010 Happy heART presented by the South Bend Museum of Art (SBMA). In partnership with the City of South Bend and DTSB, SBMA has organized the fourth year of this large scale public art project of approximately 80 banners featuring original artworks by local and world citizens of all ages. These creative and original banners will be displayed on light poles along Jefferson/Wayne Street and Michigan Street for two months, from August 2nd until the first week of October. Mayor Steve Luecke, joined Susan Visser, the Executive Director of SBMA, the Museum staff, board members, and Marco Mariani, Executive Director of DTSB in announcing the 1St 2na and 3rd place winners of the Youth, Teen, and Adult categories, listed below. Additionally, they unveiled the first banner of the exhibition which will be in place until the first week of October. A celebration recognizing the winners as well as all of the other participants will take place at Art Beat 2010 on August 28th "Festival of Banners continues to be a success due to the tremendous outreach of support from the community as witnessed by our participants' stories," said Candie Waterloo, Festival of Banners Chair and SBMA Art Instructor, "This year, the festival not only touches South Bend, but it embraces international waters as painters from as far as Thailand and South Korea have joined us. Everyone is just so eager to be involved." This spring, approximately 250 designs were submitted from a diverse pool of participants, offering their artistic rendition of a "happy heART." "Contestants were asked to think about the way that art and the heart relate to each other," said Waterloo. Approximately 80 of these banner designs were accepted and during the first week of June, participants began painting their inventive designs onto 24" x 51" pieces of canvas. Together SBMA and these artists from the local area and around the world have produced over 75 original works of public art, illustrating the heart -felt emotions of artistic expression. - more -