Denver Arts Festival returns for Memorial Day weekend

Posted: May 28, 2022 / 03:01 PM MDT

Updated: May 28, 2022 / 10:02 PM MDT

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DENVER (KDVR) — Denver’s Central Park neighborhood is celebrating 23 years of supporting the arts. During this Memorial Day weekend, they are having their annual arts festival.

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“Last year, we moved into September because of the pandemic, and the year before not at all. So it’s been three years since we’ve stood here on Memorial weekend. So we’re really happy to be back. We’d like to be the first big show of the season,” said Art Festival Director Jim Delutes.

Pre-pandemic about 50,000 people would come to the art festival each year, they’re hoping to make a full recovery so artists can also make a comeback.

“I have an allegiance towards these artists because they depend on these shows to make their living,” Delutes said. “You’d like to come away with a paycheck out of it and that’s what my job is, to make sure these artists are supported.”

Here every artist has a story about how they made each piece and every piece has a purpose.

“Most of the work that I do I have scaled these up to 29,000 pixels over a period of many months,” said Randy Thomae an abstract photographer. “I trained my brain to see what’s not there, and that’s how I became an abstract photographer. What that allows me to do is to completely transcend what I call the photographer’s trap of what do I see, and instead focus on what is it I’m trying to say in this moment. So actually, this collection is all about hope.”

Ultimately, the goal of the Denver Arts Festival is to bring people together and inspire them.

“You have a question, you know, how do you get inspired to do this piece, what made you? You can get the answer right from the person who created it, who was inspired by it. So it gives a lot more information that you can get on the art and a little more intimate meeting with the artists,” said Delutes.

With their kid’s art zone, they might even be able to cultivate the next generation of artists.

“We also found having the art, having the kids be able to do some art, that it engages them. Now they’re a little more when they go into a booth and they’re able to go wow, okay,” Delutes said.