Collingwood’s annual event for lovers of music and art is just around the corner.
The Collingwood Art Crawl is returning to Hurontario Street on Sept. 21. The Collingwood Live & Original Music Initiative is once again partnering with the Butter Gallery to present the crawl, a free, self-guided art walk, featuring more than 100 artists at multiple venues set to live music.
The art crawl itself was the brainchild of local artist and Andrea Rinaldo, owner of Butter Gallery, who started the event seven years ago.
“It’s just one of those big, fantastic community (events) with culture,” said Rinaldo. “The first year we had about 300 people who came out and eight venues. Now, we have more than 40 venues and we anticipate about 4,000 people (will attend).”
More than 70 visual artists (photography, jewellery, sculpture, paintings, mixed media, textile, and pottery), and 56 musical acts from across Ontario will all be in attendance this year. This all-original music features a range of genres, from freak-folk to jazz, and everything in between.
“One of the big drives behind it was to bring artists into the community that wouldn’t normally have that exposure,” said Rinaldo.
Last year, the Town of Collingwood merged the Collingwood Art Crawl with the Live and Original Music Initiative. The partnership will be continuing this time around.
“It worked really well,” said Rinaldo. “Merging the two together was just a win-win. It was very successful.”
New this year is the Unmissibles, which is a list of special events that will be taking place during the festivities.
This year’s list includes the Battle of the Brushes at 6 and 7 p.m. at 80 Simcoe Street, live body painting at Metra Fashion House and the Great Wall of Smalls, taking place at the Butter Gallery.
“There will be almost 350 pieces under one square foot (in size),” she said. “It will be a mosaic of almost 30 artists.”
The Collingwood Art Crawl takes place Sept. 21 from 5 to 9 p.m.
For more information, click here.