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San Ramon’s Art and Wind Festival is marking its 35th anniversary this Memorial Day weekend, with this year’s event serving as a return to the art world for its featured artist whose work is on display through the end of the month.
Pleasanton artist Rhonda Chase was selected by San Ramon organizers as the featured artist for this year’s celebration and has been hard at work in the months since getting the news on putting together both the signature piece that was commissioned by the city as well as the month-long full exhibit currently underway.
“As a featured artist for the festival you get two special things — one is the commission to actually do the main piece of art for the festival that goes on the promo materials and anything they use, and will be permanently displayed in San Ramon in one of the city buildings,” Chase told Embarcadero Media Foundation.
The commissioned piece, entitled “On the Wings of Butterflies”, is the product of multiple rounds of discussions and feedback between Chase and city organizers, as well as her own experiences at the event over the years.
“I took my kids and they’re grown now, so that was always a big deal for our family, going to see the Art and Wind Fest,” Chase said.
While visits to the annual event were an important part of the memories Chase made with her children, she said there weren’t specific sights or experiences of the festival that stood out but rather the overall scene.
“The energy and the colors and that happy feeling you get being there, so nothing specific but just that generally everything is so visually appealing and friendly and welcoming,” Chase said.
The spirit of the festival, as well as her own artistic evolution, are showcased in “On the Wings of Butterflies” — a brightly-colored drawing of whimsical butterflies with kites, balloons, and pinwheels printed on their wings that evoke the sight and spirit of the Art and Wind Festival.
“We went through a lot of sketches and ideas, and they wanted to have something that showed the park itself or one of the community buildings, and then just really show that light and airy wind, and they wanted kites or pinwheels or stuff like that,” Chase said.
The Art and Wind Festival was first established in 1989, making it one of the longest-running and most popular celebrations in the city’s history since its incorporation in 1983. It serves as the most prominent Memorial Day weekend celebration in the San Ramon Valley, having expanded to a unique attraction drawing attendees from around the region to San Ramon’s Central Park in the years since its origin as a small street fair broadly celebrating visual arts in general.
In addition to the signature attractions (art and wind), the two-day event is set to feature three stages full of entertainment, gourmet food, family amusement zones and children’s shows as well as the return of a popular kite-making workshop and choreographed kite-flying demonstrations.
The event is also known for its annual Memorial Day program and commemorative field of flags, aimed at capturing the spirit of the annual commemorative holiday by remembering lives lost in the U.S. military, with the program kicking off at 9 a.m. on Monday.
Later on Monday, Chase is set to join the festivities with a poster signing scheduled from 1-3 p.m. in the Lindsay Dirkx-Brown Gallery at the San Ramon Community Center, where a full exhibit of her work is on display through May 31 — her first show in years, consisting of between 50 and 70 pieces in total.
“I took a long time off from fine art to make money, raise kids, all of that, and now I’m back doing fine art again, and to have a show this large is really exciting,” Chase said.
The San Ramon Art and Wind Festival is scheduled for this Sunday and Monday (May 26-27) from 11 a.m. to 6 p.m. at 12501 Alcosta Blvd. More information and a full schedule of events is available at www.sanramon.ca.gov.