Wednesday, September 9, 2009
{The Blue Banner}
Page 10
LAAFF fills downtown streets with artistic variety
By Noor Al-Sibai
Staff Writer
NAALSIBA@UNCA.EDU
Festival
Recap
Fairy wings, rain-
bow-hued hair, pirate
attire and other sun
dry modes of dress
adorned this year’s Lexington Avenue
Arts and Fun Festival. Festival-goers, art
ists and vendors alike said LAAFF is the
most local of happenings in Asheville.
LAAFF ran from 11 a.m. to 9 p.m.
on Sunday. The three stages, two court
yards, 60 vendors and six bus tours made
LAAFF a success, according to PR di
rector Erin Scholze.
“The community really owns it, which
is amazing” said Scholze.
The stages, placed at various locations
on Lexington Avenue, were the Greenlife
Electric stage, the Mountain Xpress Wal
nut stage and the BoBo Gallery stage.
Each stage offered up a variety of local
and national acts, from Pierce Edens to
the nationally acclaimed Blue Rags.
“There’s no such thing as free time,
and I’m not so sure about luck. There’s
no easy way to break up,” sang Shane
Conerty and female lead singer Dulci as
their band, Now You See Them, played
the Mountain Xpress stage.
Listeners at New You See Them show
included a couple from Knoxville, Tenn.
who came to LAAFF exclusively for
the band and for beer, and a baby with
a mohawk who split his time between
schmoozing with the audience and lead
singer Conerty.
Now You See Them, originally from
Pennsylvania, were very excited to play
LAAFF according to drummer Jason
Mercer.
Down the street and a few hours later.
Ami Worthen and Jason Krekel of Mad
Tea Party ravaged the crowd as various
fairy-winged women boogied like zom
bies alongside men in skirts and face-
painted children.
Around sunset at the BoBo stage,
acoustic singer-songwriter Angi West
captivated the crowd with a voice remi
niscent of folk singer Joanna Newsom as
fans lounged on the street.
West’s breathy, gospel-tinged vocals
accentuated the dwindling sunlight and
the ambiance it created during the fes
tival.
The cross-legged audience sat in a
hush as Mad Tea Party’s vocalist smiled
near the sound booth.
Songwriter’s circle at Liquid Dragon
Tattoo’s courtyard had the appearance of
spontaneity as local songwriters demo
cratically performed acoustic versions of
their own music.
“It’s just amazing to hear a person with
their instrument and their song” said
Rory Carroll, a local performer.
Cello during Ash Devine’s haunting
performance flowed with Carroll’s blue
sy voice, while Now You See Them’s
Conerty brought about an upbeat note.
“I’m so grateful to be a part of this
community,” Carroll said.
Indeed, community was a dominant
theme at LAAFF.
Groups of friends gathered on the
street and in front of stages, parents and
children conversed with other families,
and strangers stopped to talk to not only
those dressed outlandishly, but to offer
genuine compliments to each other.
The party atmosphere was supported
by the nature of the goods being sold.
Booths selling handmade jewelry and
local foods were flanked by vendors
selling clothes both tie-dye and hand
printed, as well as novelty stands selling
paintings and pottery.
One such stand was a man with the
bottle cap truck, a mainstay at arts fes
tivals such as LEAF, whose proprietor
was wearing a white tailcoat with multi
colored fuzzy craft balls.
The eccentric attire of many of the fes
tival goers fazed none, and were even
considered by some to be beautiful.
“The most beautiful thing I saw was
a woman with curly hair down to her
knees” said Tommy, a local attendee.
“She was slow-dancing.”
Alongside festival-billed oddities such
as bike jousting were many impromptu
happenings, a symbiosis of street perfor
mances and participating spectators.
Near Spiritex clothing store, a woman
played harpsichord for hours while an
other woman played a silver painted
snare drum.
The performance art of LAAFF did not
end with musicians. There were at least
three people on stilts roaming the festi
val at their leisure, sometimes stopping
to pose with other personalities, and oth
erwise perpetuating the carnival atmo
sphere the festival created.
Another of the festival’s main draws
was the beer.
Eight local breweries supplied LAAFF
attendees with enough plastic cups to
need “compost only” trash-cans.
The community building reached be
yond Lexington Avenue.
Various shops sold scraps of fabric
and took donations to support Respon
sive Education Accessing Creativity for
Healing, or REACH, a program for bat
tered women.
LAAFF’s impact varies almost as
much as the outfits of those who attend,
but they all agree on at least one note:
Ashevillians, out-of-towners and artists
alike love LAAFF.
Photos by Noor Al-Sibai
Shane Conerty of Now You See Them, above, performs next
toddler. Mad Tea Party plays the Greenlife Electric Stage.
- staff Writer
to a