In just a few weeks time, collectors and creatives will descend upon the streets of East Vancouver in their droves for the annual Eastside Culture Crawl. The four-day arts festival, running Nov. 20 - 23, will welcome the visitors into more than 80 buildings where over 500 emerging and established artists will have opened the doors of their personal studios to showcase their works. The free festival, now in its 29th year, is set to be bigger than it has ever been. “Currently, we have approximately 520 artists that will be opening up their spaces this year, and we’re expecting around 40,000 attendees,” says the festival’s artistic director and co-founder Esther Rausenberg. Twenty-nine years of existence for a festival that champions the arts, an industry that has consistently suffered under the strain of economic pressure, is quite the achievement. Rausenberg puts its success down to the Vancouver public’s consistent desire to feel stimulated and inspired, benefits the Eastside Culture Crawl offers in abundance. “(The festival) has really expanded and I think it’s a testament to the fact that people are really interested in the visual arts, they’re interested in seeing craft and new design, furniture making and glass blowing, and this really does provide something for everyone,” she says. Artists set to feature at this year’s event specialise in a range of mediums, from printmaking and painting to photography, ceramics, and sculpture. “The quality of work that is being presented is really quite extraordinary,” says Rausenberg, who helped kickstart the first edition in 1996 when it spotlighted just a handful of artists in three buildings. If guests are taken by a particular piece of art they can inquire about it and make a purchase through the artist, but the event’s aim isn’t to make sales—it’s to ignite creativity and conversation. “The public is quite fascinated by the behind-the-scenes look at what that creative environment looks like,” says Rausenberg, adding how the artists are “extremely approachable” and are happy to answer all kinds of questions inquisitive guests may have, whether it be regarding their inspirations of choice of medium. “We really just want people to feel comfortable just coming and looking at the work, and being in awe of some of the things that they have created.” Year in, year out, there is rarely a visitor who walks away from the festival feeling as though they haven’t connected to a piece, and that, says Rausenberg, is “what’s most important.”
