September 2015 marks the 50th anniversary of Rochester's Art & Apples Festival. The very first Art & Apples Festival (or Art 'N' Apples, as it was known then) was opened for a four-day run on September 16, 1965 with a parade down Main Street, led by Rochester's First and Finest, the Falcon Marching Band. The Rochester Arts Commission, under the general chairmanship of Dr. John Solverson, developed the plan for Art 'N' Apples and brought the first event to fruition with the assistance of several civic organizations. The festival drew an estimated 20,000 visitors in its inaugural year; Paint Creek Center for the Arts, which now sponsors the festival, estimates that more than 200,000 art enthusiasts will visit during the 2015 event.
Artists participating in the 2015 festival will come from all over the United States and Canada, but the first festival in 1965 had a distinctly local flavor. A large tent featured the classroom art of students from the Rochester Community Schools. Children eagerly pulled their parents by the hand to show them the projects they and their classmates had been working on. Adult artists from the community were able to showcase their efforts in the "Sunday Painters" tent, where friends and neighbors could stop by to admire their work.
More information about the 50th anniversary Art & Apples Festival may be found here.
Tuesday, September 1, 2015
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