A total of 72 artists will participate in this year’s River Art Festival in downtown Hannibal on May 24 and 25, including 15 making their local festival debut.
Entertainers always attract crowds of festival-goers, and a stage will be provided for their convenience this year. Michael Gaines, executive director of the Hannibal Acts Council, which sponsors the festival, explained, “we will have a stage again at (North) Main and Bird streets, because it was very successful at the (Autumn Historic) Folklife Festival last fall.”
Two booths will have special activities for children. They are the Worlds of Wonder and the Roosters Crow Art Center.
The number of food booths will increase over last year, with four churches and five organizations having food booths.
The people attending this years’s Memorial Day weekend festival may choose between baked potatoes and sloppy Joes served by Mount Zion Christian Church; candied apples and baked goods by Christ Apostalic Temple No. 3; catfish sandwiches by the Knights of Columbus No. 907; footlong corn dogs by Hannibal Masonic Lodge AF & AM, No. 188; funnel cakes and barbecued pork steak by PRYFEECT; kettle korn by Hydesburg United Methodist Church; Philly cheese steaks by the NEMO Humane Society, Polish sausage, hot dogs and nachos by Willow Street Christian Church; and smoked turkey legs by Palmyra Masonic Lodge No. 18.
The festival’s main focus has evolved over the years, Gaines explained. “It’s been an arts and crafts festival, then arts and crafts and fine art, and then we wanted more fine art.” The artists are selected by a committee.
The festival is traditionally on Memorial Day weekend, he said, and he believes it does not compete with the holiday events. “For a holiday weekend we have a three-day weekend,” Gaines said. “The festival is for two days, and there is still time to do something for Memorial Day.”
With the rising price of gas, he added, the arts council focused its advertising within 75 miles of Hannibal.
“Festivals are changing,” he said. “Not only people coming but the exhibitors. They spend gas money to come and stay the night and cover their expenses.”
The price of gas may give people a reason to attend events close to home, he said, however, one thing in the news does not affect the festival or any other event in downtown Hannibal. That is the rising Mississippi River.
Gaines explained that the river rose this spring enough to have the flood gates at Hannibal installed, but the flood wall will protect the downtown regardless of the river level, and “the downtown is totally not affected by high water.”
Considering the types of artists who apply to participate at the River Art Festival, Gaines said the arts council could fill every booth with jewelry. A variety of jewelry will be displayed, along with paintings, drawings, wood products, edibles, dried flowers, leather items, soaps, baskets, blacksmith items, sculpture, pottery and photographs.
Among Hannibal people and businesses participating will be Dick and Heidi Hehmeyer Artistic Crafts, the Roosters Crow Art Center, Worlds of Wonder, Renee Healy Fine Arts, Celenze Outsider Art, Alliance Art Gallery, HCBD Inc., Tim Murphy Flintnapping, Batch-o-Brittle, Moosehead Woodworks and Betty’s Baskets and More.
Also from the area will be Reflections of Missouri of Louisiana, Ehrenberger Forge of Shelbyville, Ohio Street Originals of Quincy, Ill., and Espebe Paper of Quincy, Ill. Additional artists are coming from Missouri, Illinois and Iowa.
