My topic, The Atlanta Arts Festival at Piedmont Park 2010 in Atlanta, GA, is my personal experience. It may not reflect the experiences of all attending artists or even most of them.
This was my first Atlanta show and I had great expectations. My wife and I had heard that the set-up take-down procedures could be difficult due to the one-way, tight layout at Piedmont. Thus, we were prepared for a hassle. However, the folks who were responsible for set-up were well organized. Artists were given specific sign-in times on specific days. We reported to a parking lot about one mile from the park. There, we were given our packets and very specific instructions about how to set-up. We left at a designated time and drove out of the parking lot with a police escort. Hats off to the Atlanta PD as they shut down traffic on the road leading into the park and whisked us off to set-up. That part went super smoothly. When we arrived at out booth location, the area was a little tight but it didn't matter since there was no other traffic. We had 90 minutes max to set-up. With both of us working frantically, we finished just as a motorcycle cop showed up to tell us we needed to move our vehicle. Lucky for us. Most artists had not finished set-up and had to come back later to get finished. Everyone left as we had entered, in a caravan. We were given designated parking areas. Ours was the "coaches" parking lot adjacent to a school. From there, we had a 1/2 mile walk back to our booth. Since we were finished, that wasn't really a problem.
The show location at Piedmont was great. Beautiful, with abundant large shade trees made for an inviting site. We were lucky to have dense shade all morning. However, by 1 o'clock, we were cooking in the sunlight. Thankfully, dire warnings about keeping off the grass were not enforced. We were able to place all extra art work and gear behind our booth. Since it was shady there in the PM, we moved behind the booth for relief and rolled up the back wall of the booth so we could see what was going on and folks attending could see us.
The crowds varied. I'm not certain, but my guess would be that the entire distance around the park road where artists were displaying comprised 1/2 mile, perhaps more. Since it was so stretched out, the crowd was sometimes sparse and sometimes heavy. Many people seemed more out for a stroll than anything else.
Artist amenities, IMO, were ho-hum. The awards ceremony was outdoors in the heat and flies. Adjacent to the awards ceremony tent, was a rock band blaring so loudly as to deafen anyone nearby. Luckily, I am already deaf and wear hearing aids. I just turned off the aids for relief. The rest of the artists got their eardrums over worked. Evening food was pretty good.
Typically, I make $2,000+ on a weekend. At this show, I didn't sell a single piece of my work! I was flabbergasted. Since the area is near the affluent enclave of Buckhead, I was sure there would be lots of buyers. Guess this sort of misplaced optimism is why I've never won the lotto either.
Take down was, as usual, a bit of a rush. We were told to break everything down, place it curb-side and when ready to load, get a pass from one of the people monitoring different sections of the show. Luckily, we broke down fast (we also started early at 5:30 rather than at 6:00 as told) and were ready early. I got our pass and jogged the 1/2 mile back to the parking lot, got back , stuffed the truck full and got out when the first cop came through to escort artists who might have finished. Our escorted "caravan" consisted of me and one other artist.... :)
I won't be going back to Atlanta to either this festival or the Dogwood, held at the same location. It would have been better for us had we stayed home. Frankly, I don't know if this is typical for Atlanta or if the economy has smothered serious buying. It would be my suggestion to charge a gate fee. Yes, the crowd might be smaller but it would limit the number of people out for a stroll and those who did pay would likely be more serious about buying artwork. Of course, given what happened to me, if a fee was charged, maybe no one would show up.
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Sabrina