Volunteers Needed for Oregon City Festival of the Arts 2023
It’s that time again! Time to start forming committees for our big premier arts festival. The 2022 Festival was an enormous success, but it was coordinated by a handful of members-mostly board members. We need an army of volunteers for the 2023 event to make it even more successful. When volunteering for a position, you will be assisted by the previous year’s lead and not left on your own to “figure it out”. This is a professionally run event and we want everyone to be successful and that means teamwork!
There will be a meeting the end of January or beginning of February to begin planning. Below are some suggestions for volunteering.
Assistant Volunteer Coordinator: You’ll be assisting Kerry when she is traveling. The position would help recruit volunteers, communicate when there are questions and helping the weekend of the festival.
Food and Entertainment: These two committee chairs will be working with Sue Woodworth.
Silent Auction Coordinator: This committee will work with Cathy Rowe to learn how to reach out to artists and the community for auction items. The silent auction is where we make most of our profits from the event and very important for the future shows.
Signage Coordinator: Work with Lynda and Ingrid for reserving spaces to install our signage-cross street banner, billboard, light pole banners and set up large banner at site week before show.
Wow, just wow! What an amazing event this year! We had well over 3,000 visitors during the weekend. The parking lot was always full all weekend! Saturday morning we saw a constant stream of people entering the festival! Our artists gave the festival an average of 8.8 appreciation rating. Many said this festival had the best sales they’ve seen in years!
I’ll let them speak for themselves:
Well done everyone!! A great show, well organized and lots of visitors. This show continues to be a delight. We have enjoyed this event every year. Our thanks to you all for all your hard work and friendly faces
This was an amazing event and the anticipation for next year is already an exciting seed in my mind. Kudos to all of you wonderful folks and all your hard work.
Wow! I so appreciate the work of the OC Festival of the Arts Committee! You are super organized, your volunteers are the greatest, and your publicity is amazing!!
Thank you, thank you, thank you!
Thanks so much for the awesome show!!!! I had the best sales I’ve ever had at the event. So nice to see you and everybody again. I had a lot of my clients come and a lot of annual regulars who stopped in to buy bling.
You, the committee and all the volunteers were so very terrific! This is why I love this event. I hope you all get to take a well-deserved break.
Much Appreciation ~
Just a small example of the feedback from our artists. Truly heartwarming!
As the event coordinator, I would like to give kudos to our committee members who put in hours of planning to make this happen! Several members like Melody Bush were behind the scenes posting on Social Media daily. Yelena Shabrova kept all the applications and communications current. Ingrid Aubry used her magic creating our postcards, posters, banners, programs, and billboards for the event. Nancy Graham kept the financial information current along with those boring insurance details! Susan Woodworth signed up the music and food vendors, while being a vendor in the event and a television personality for our KATU commercial. Cathy Rowe manned the Silent Auction again this year and did her magic with the online bidding and gathering the auction items. Thank you to Tima Carlson and Soul Flags for hosting the Children’s Art activities. Lynne Collum created the artist booth signs and badges this year. Tamara Scott was the keeper of the key for the Storage Unit and always ready to help move supplies. Last but one of the most important committee chairs was Kerry Edwards who set up the volunteers for the festival. Kerry was invaluable and worked with me coordinating this event. She went above and beyond setting the volunteer schedules, she was my right hand in organizing the event! She always had a smile on her face even when trying to go in 2 directions at the same time!
Special thanks to our sponsors this year, World Heart, Citizens Bank and Double J Construction. If you have a chance to visit our sponsors, please thank them for their support.
Can’t forget to thank our Oregon City Tourism Department and Daniel Gehring for his support and getting us on KATU television for our interviews. The interview went out to the wider Portland community, and I believe increased our visitor count during the weekend.
Now the process begins for planning our 2023 Premier Art Event!
Lynda Orzen OCFOTA Coordinator
Updated September 1st, 2022: Oregon City Festival of the Arts got Silver in the Best Festival in Oregon City from Readers Choice Awards through the Pamplin press!
By Kerry Edwards, Volunteer Coordinator for OCFOTA
The Oregon City Festival of the Arts is coming up on August 13 and 14 and we are looking for volunteers to help out. Whatever time you can contribute would be greatly appreciated – whether it is a couple of hours, a morning, afternoon – or even the whole weekend!
If you have a child or grandchild over 15 who would like to help out – make it a family event! It’s going to be a fun weekend with a large variety of artists’ booths, all day live musical performances, food vendors and entertainment and a silent auction. A great way to contribute while you enjoy the Festival of the Arts.
Updated May 10th, 2022: We are extending the deadline for artists to jury into the Oregon City Festival of the Arts till May 31.
For the sixth year, the Three Rivers Artist Guild is presenting an arts, culture and heritage event known as the Oregon City Festival of the Arts (OCFOTA) on August 13 and 14, 2022.
The Festival will be held at the End of the Oregon Trail Interpretive & Visitor Information Center located at 1726 Washington Street, Oregon City, OR 97045. Hours of Operation are 10-5 both days.
OCFOTA draws an attendance of approximately 2000 throughout the weekend. This event is free to the public.
This is a juried art show open to residents of Oregon and Washington State. If interested, an application and a nonrefundable $25 jury fee is due no later than May 31, 2022.
There is space for approximately 55 artists. If accepted, the booth fee is $135. This includes your booth space (10’ x 10’) and marketing for the event.
Please note: This is an outdoor event on the grass. Although we make every effort to find the most level and suitable booth spaces, not all locations are perfectly flat. There is no power available for the booths. Please note, we periodically experience inclement weather. The ground may be wet. Please be prepared for potential showers and wind.
No more than two artists may share a booth and art must be compatible. Both artists must be juried in and send in separate applications and jury fees. You will share the booth fee of $135.
Important Dates to remember
May 15, 2022: Jury fee and application due date.
June 15, 2022: Jury results sent to artists.
June 30, 2022: $135 booth payments due.
August 12, 2022: Friday Festival set-up
August 13 and 14, 2022: Oregon City Festival of the Arts
Application to jury and payment
If interested, please fill out the application form below. Please note that if accepted, your bio will be used for social media advertising. What you include in your statement is exactly what will be posted on Instagram and Facebook for marketing. Please make it approximately 100 words. The digital images are what we will be using for the jury process – so submit your best work!
Soulflags Art Center, a new addition to Main Street, is bringing an opportunity for the community to take part in beautifying the intersection of Hwy 99E and Main Street with several mosaic panels of well-known masterpieces altered to include an Oregon City landmark or icon. In addition, Soulflags created an art design contest for one of the panels to be created by a local artist.
The winner of this contest was Cathy Rowe, who recreated Henri Matisse’s “The Dance” with the figures depicted as pioneers with the End of the Oregon Trail Interpretive Center in the background. Soulflags will recreate an outlined/sketched version of Rowe’s painting onto a grid pattern of sixty 6-inch x 6-inch square tiles for the community to glaze/paint. These tiles combined will make a 3-foot by 5-foot mosaic masterpiece.
With several mosaics completed at TRAG’s Festival of the Arts, tiles will be available to glaze/paint at Oregon City’s Saturday Market on several occasions if necessary. Dates to be announced as Soulflags needs to contact the OC Saturday Market to coordinate. Soulflags will fire the ceramic tiles and grout the tile to concrete backer board. Mosaics will be displaced locally prior to placing on building located at 504 Main Street.
COVID couldn’t stop us this year and neither could the weather! This year’s Festival of the Arts was a huge success for artists and visitors alike. The festival saw an estimated 2500 attendees. Trieste made sure to speak with all the artists on Sunday right before breakdown. She wanted to thank each one of them for attending and inquired about sales. 99% of the artists claimed it to be a very successful event financially. About half a dozen said it was the best show they had ever attended.
Trieste thanked all the volunteers that helped with this year’s event. It really takes a community of artists to present a large event. There is a lot of planning to take place behind the scenes. Planning for an event of this size takes at least a year to organize. We were thrilled to be able to open this year despite Covid restrictions and the heat. Even with the heat both days, record numbers of visitors came through both days. The strategically placed misters helped keep everyone cooler! Noticed a lot of larger art pieces leaving with our guests.
Thanks to some of the volunteers: Jeanne Cardana and Gary who volunteered for most of the day Saturday, Cheri Bosserman for lending us misters that literally saved lives throughout the weekend. Lynda Orzen who volunteered all three days, Sue Woodworth who not only managed the performers but had a booth, and Jeanne Kelly Brown also had a booth. Committee members this year were truly phenomenal – Kerry Edwards and Rochelle Rau managed the volunteers and kept the ball rolling throughout the weekend. Melody Bush, our social media point person who truly was a huge reason for our success, Cheri who kept us on budget and managed the finances, Lynda Orzen for her experience and volunteerism, Ingrid Aubry for the flyers, postcards, ads, and programs. Cathy Rowe ran the first virtual silent auction which turned out to be a huge success. Yelena – who was called on non-stop for online application help, announcements, and website. Last but not the least was Trieste family of 7 members and most importantly her husband Roger who helped her every step of the way.
This is Trieste’s last year as President and won’t be organizing the 2022 event. There will be a manual available on “How To” and quite a few members with years of experience. The more these events take place, the easier it gets through the years. We know an army of volunteers will step forward to create the 2022 Oregon City Festival of the Arts! The Festival has become a signature arts event in Oregon City! Let’s keep it growing!
The Oregon City Festival of the Arts is taking place August 14 and 15 with check in and set up for artists on the 13th. Volunteers are our biggest need. The following are available volunteer times with a short description of what is needed.
Whatever time you can contribute is greatly appreciated – whether a couple hours, a morning, an afternoon or even the whole weekend. It’s a great way to contribute while enjoying the Festival, and something the whole family can participate in.
As a complimentary gift, each volunteer will receive a $5 coupon for a food truck of their choice.
