After 58 years of organizing a festival to support the arts, the eclectic residents of Sunset Beach were not about to let a massive sanitary sewer project stand in the way of another good time this past weekend, as massive crowds gathered to support the Las Damas Art Festival once again.
Over the past six decades, residents of the tiny community of Sunset Beach have banded together on Mother’s Day weekend in May to have a good time for a very good cause. All the proceeds from the weekend festival will be used to award grants to art programs for local schools and nonprofit organizations.
On Friday, under the big tent at the Sunset Beach Community Center, Las Damas officially recognized the many artists who competed in this year’s art show.
“We had a few obstacles this year,” said Las Damas President Josey Dentzer, “but everyone worked together, and it looks like we’re going to have another great festival,” she said on Friday as the festival kicked off with its famous Art Show.
Local artist Bill Anderson, who operates his own Sunset Beach gallery and whose unique work can be found throughout Southern California, was this year’s featured artist.
“The Sunset Beach Art Festival is a fantastic community event that pays attention to visual arts,” said Anderson.
“Our student art is a product of Las Damas’ commitment to the importance of art education at all levels,” Dentzer said, “and our ongoing support of our students in local communities.”
“It is a true showcase of the enormous talent of local students and future artists,” said Dentzer.
She said there were a total of 60 students submitting work this year, nine were awarded prize ribbons for their exemplary art (see story below).
Among the commercial artists, Peggy Minger-McCants’ mixed-media compilation of “Liberty” was named Best of Show. Other artists, such as Jennifer Tribe, attracted loads of attention for her creative work of arranging delicate seashells in shapes and mounted them on wooded frames with lightly inlaid messaging.
“I love walking the beaches and find such rare shells,” she said. Tribe said the barnacles in one of her works produce concrete much harder than the dentists who use cement to anchor teeth. “They are still trying to figure out how to make it,” she said Friday.
The Las Damas organization has continually put this event together for 58 years, with the women over the years coming together to raise money that will be used for grants to local schools and art programs to produce student art.
In addition to the art show and live music, the classic white top tents are set up along the greenbelt where vendors, many of whom have been coming for decades, sell their handmade wares. Organizers this year were especially challenged because of infrastructure work that took up much of where the festival generally sets up.
Therefore, vendors were shifted more toward the end of the street but all seemed to take it in stride.
“I see lots of my regular customers,” said vendor Stefan Basi, who along with his wife Mary, create handmade jewelry and leather goods that they sell at the Sunset Beach Art Show each year for decades.
“People love to come back and support their homemade art and merchandise,” Basi said.
Patrick Santos, with Aloha Specialties, brings merchandise handmade in Hawaii to Sunset Beach each year to sell. “Business is fine,” he said.
Santos came in with his merchandise from Las Vegas, where his company has a distribution facility but said he would miss the show. His booth was within eyeshot of the big sewer construction project but said he didn’t mind a bit.
“I like the Sunset Beach festival because it’s kind of like being back in Hawaii, I can hear the waves,” he said, selling his special peanut butter and other items made “fresh” in Hawaii.
And of course, you can’t have a festival without music, and this year, the Sunset Beach Art Festival had plenty of it. Bands, musical groups and others made sure the group rocking, rolling or doing the hoe down all three days of the festival.
“I come with my family every year,” said Jack Brewer of Huntington Beach. Jack was there with his wife, his dog Annabelle, and his grown daughter, her dog and her boyfriend.
“We’ve been coming for many years,” he said, “and it is always a very good time.”
Chris MacDonald contributed to this story
