What a grand, grand eighth annual ArtWorks Festival we had! The weather was perfect and the people came!

It is such fun to celebrate artists, musicians, authors, actors and all things art in our community!  And to have it in downtown Austin to be able to enjoy our local businesses, makes it even more of a party.

We were thrilled to hear the comments from the visitors talking about how friendly the people are and how beautiful our community is!  The flower baskets and pots in downtown Austin were at their peak for our festival.

As you well know, to have such a successful community event, it takes many, many people. We want to thank Laura Helle, our festival director, and all of her talented staff for their creativity and all the extra hours they put in.

And then there is our incredible Steering Committee of 28 people who work from January to make sure that their part of the festival is successful. It is so exciting to see it all come together!

We have added events now to make it a Festival Week, instead of just Saturday and Sunday there are over 280 people who volunteer during that time.  It is just a joy to look out over the crowd and see all the volunteer t-shirts!

We also want to thank all the people who came to the festival and the events that we had during the week.  We appreciate your taking the time out of your busy schedules to enjoy the activities.

There is something very special about a community getting together to celebrate the arts.  We are so amazed and blessed with all the talent that we have here in Austin and then it’s so exciting to add the talent from seven other states to the mix to make a marvelous event for all to enjoy!

Thank you,

Bonnie Besse Rietz and Mary Anne Wolesky

Co-chairs, eight annual Austin ArtWorks Festival