It’s been a little while since the 6^th Annual Via Colori ended and before I dive into the plans for the 2012 event, I wanted to sit down and share with you my reflections from my second year as the Event Manager of the Via Colori Street Painting festival. 

I can only sum up Via Colori as event-FULL!  This past year was a non-stop thrill! From coordinating 163 sponsors, working with several community partners and a record 13 Guest Artists, to creating new activities, organizing new art forms to feature during the festival, and hosting an additional event within the event. The whole Via Colori team was on overdrive this year and oh yeah, did I mention I broke my foot and had to wear a walking boot for 3 months!

If you did not get a chance to join us at this year’s festival, you really missed a lot. Hopefully once I give you some highlights, you will have something to look forward to come this fall:

• 20,000 people came downtown to witness over 200 artists creating works of art on the streets
• The music line-up was diverse, entertaining and featured some of the best bands in our city!
• The KIPP Dance crew rocked the library plaza with several dance performances over the weekend; the crowds were huge and those kids ate up the attention
• Snapple was the official beverage of our festival this year (also includes Dr. Pepper, 7up, Dr. Pepper 10 and Diet).  But the coolest part was working with their marketing team who brought in the Reverend Butter to perform one of his chain-saw wielding works of art out of ice and he also brought the fire . . .It was HOT!
• Starbucks was there not only to sell coffee but they also donated coffee and breakfast for all of our artists over the weekend – I also appreciated the caffeine each morning
• I was very fortunate to meet the wonderful peeps at Houston Street Art who introduced me to Bryan Cope and Billy Jewkes, two talented local aerosol artist.  Street Art Splash was a “graffiti art installation” and Billy and Bryan headed up this project which featured a 3 panel fixture they built themselves to spray and paint…and this was not the stuff you see on the streets…it was a work of art!
• In efforts to add new forms of art to the festival I also connected with Natalie Irish, you all may remember seeing her on the cover of the Houston Press last fall.  She creates incredible works with paint using her lips!  Yes - she makes out with the canvas.  She and her husband Dennis are some of my new favorite people.  We had her scheduled on Saturday afternoon, but the wind was so incredibly strong there was no way to have her and the canvas out there. So we moved her to Sunday.  Dennis built a giant 6’ x 9’ easel that hung her 6’ long canvas, where she painted the Houston skyline with her lips
• ·         So that brings me to the event within an event the Via Colori Street Scene, which featured a scavenger hunt. Our fabulous fall intern Alyssa Acosta came up with some clever, yet difficult clues.  There were great prizes, Barefoot Wine and Saint Arnold beer samplings along with a delish buffet by Carrabba’s 

The Street Scene event was an adventure as it was going on at the same time I was shutting the festival down. Luckily I work with an amazing team and together with 400 volunteers the festival went off without a hitch (well that’s all you need to know J).

So even with my trusty golf cart on stand-by at all times, I still was unable to see all of the amazing squares.  It was not until after the festival, when the wonderful Houston Event Photography sent in his disk with pictures of each and every square.  So here we are in the middle of January and I am already planning and meeting with companies to bring some exciting new features to this year’s festival.   I highly recommend you go to your calendar right now and save the date for Saturday and Sunday November 17 – 18, 2012. You will not be sorry! 

For all of the above I encourage you to check out our recap video and the Houston Via Colori website as a picture is worth a 1,000 words and I have only given you 750 here.