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Route 22 Artist Collective Gallery bringing back Art in the Park

Kruger called Art in the Park a celebration of both nature and art. 
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After a successful inaugural event in 2022, Art in the Park is returning to Glenbow Ranch Provincial Park in west Rocky View County this weekend.

As long as the smoke clears, the annual Art in the Park festival will be returning to Glenbow Ranch Provincial Park on May 27 and 28. 

The artist-led initiative was introduced last year and was a hit among Cochrane-area residents, according to Lara Kruger, the executive director of the Route 22 Artist Collective Gallery, which puts on the event in collaboration with the Glenbow Ranch Park Foundation.

Last year's inaugural festival saw 25 artists participate, setting up their easels to paint the stunning scenery on display throughout the sprawling provincial park southeast of Cochrane town limits. Kruger said she hopes to see an increase in participation among local painters this year.

“It’s basically a festival where artists go out into the park and paint outdoors, in the tradition of plein air painting, which is a long tradition that’s happened all over the world throughout the last few hundred years,” Kruger explained.

“We just thought we’d initiate this festival last year with Glenbow Ranch Park Foundation to see if we could get something happening, and it was really well received. So we’re doing it again this year, and we’re collaborating with these four other arts organizations that are doing similar festivals.”

According to Kruger, this year's iteration of Art in the Park is part of Come Paint Alberta, an arts festival circuit that aims to showcase the province's arts scene with a welcoming and diverse atmosphere. The five-stop circuit also includes events at four other iconic southern Alberta locations from May to September, including the Leighton Art Centre, Rosebud Art Collective, Whyte Museum of the Canadian Rockies, and Coutts Centre for Western Heritage.

Route 22's event will be the first of those five events. 

“We’re trying to get it into a more organized circuit format so we can cross-promote it across the region,” Kruger said.

New to Art in the Park this year is collaboration with the local Indigenous community. Kruger said Stoney Nakoda First Nation knowledge-keepers and elders will be at the park on both days to bless the event and to educate attendees and share their knowledge of the Glenbow Ranch Provincial Park lands' history from an Indigenous perspective.

“Because it’s a land-based festival, it makes sense to bring in the traditional landowners and keepers of this area, so we invited them to be a part of it this week and they were happy to do that,” she said. “It’s something we’d like to grow – to have more Indigenous engagement in terms of programming and all aspects of the festival going forward.”

After the two days of painting, Kruger said the event will wrap up on Sunday afternoon with a live auction event, where the paintings created throughout the weekend will be available for purchase. The auction will take place at the Route 22 Artist Collective Gallery, located in the Cochrane Safeway plaza. 

The May 28 auction will be preceded by a parking lot party from noon to 2 pm, featuring live music and a tent set-up where visitors can enjoy their lunches.

“We’re in the Safeway plaza, so there’s plenty of food options for people to choose from,” Kruger said. “Then, the live art auction is a wine-and-cheese ticketed event and we’ll auction off those works.”

Proceeds from the auction sales will support both the Glenbow Ranch Park Foundation and Route 22. 

Kruger called Art in the Park a celebration of both nature and art. 

“We’re really trying to bring art and culture more to the forefront of our community through this event and hopefully build that as a segment of the community that is more visible and accessible to everyone,” she said.

For more information on Art in the Park, Kruger said to visit a landing page set up for the event at Route22Gallery.com. She said that page provides information on how to sign up as a painter (the deadline is May 25) as well as a spot to buy tickets for the auction.

She noted members of the public are invited and encouraged to stop by Glenbow Ranch Provincial Park on either the Saturday or Sunday to see the paintings as they're being created. Interpretive guided photography and nature tours will also be available.

To facilitate transportation to and from the park on that day, the Town of Cochrane is providing free shuttle services through Cochrane On-demand Local Transit (COLT), according to the press release.

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