Civic Space Park welcomed the sixth Phoenix Annual Parade of the Arts on Saturday night. The theme for this year’s celebration was “A Day in the Park, Night in the City.”
With collaboration from the Office of the Mayor, the Downtown Phoenix Partnership and Production Agency of the Participatory Arts, LLC, the Phoenix Annual Parade of the Arts was able to put on their award-winning event.
Sahar Mitchell, organizer of the parade and co-founder of the Production Agency of the Participatory Arts with Ryan Winters and Stephen Strange, said there were three main goals to achieve this year in preparation for the event.
“The first is to celebrate the arts and culture of Phoenix. We feel there isn’t enough credit given to Phoenix for its creativity and expression, so we brought in a lot more outside artists for the community of Phoenix to enjoy,” Mitchell said. “The second, of course, is to bring the community together for a free, family fun-based event. There isn’t a lot of red tape around events like this so we wanted to make it as accessible as possible. And finally we wanted to keep the event green. We used recycled materials and set up recycle bins at every station. The bicycle community also played a huge part of this event and we ultimately wanted to encourage people to go and take a walk around Phoenix instead of driving.”
The event started at 3 p.m. with music, inflatable bounce houses and crafts like puppets, sidewalk chalk, balloons and flags for the kids. As the day slowly turned into night, the Civic Space Park filled and different dance teams took the stage, the costume contest winners were revealed and the actual Parade finally took place.
Rachel Day, a 27-year-old from Tempe and member of the Spell Dance Team, was among the dance performers. “Radia,” Day’s performance name, said she has attended the event for all of the six years it has been held, but the last two years she has actually participated in the performances.
“I love doing family friendly events. I think that fun outdoor events really bring everyone together in a positive, uplifting and energetic environment,” Day said.
Day, who was dressed from head to toe in a sparkly silver a blue outfit with her own hula-hoop, hosted a hula-hoop activity for the kids after her performance.
Dannetta Montley, a 34-year-old mother from San Francisco was also in attendance at the event. Montley said she found out about the parade by an application on her cell phone called Active Moms. She decided to come and check it out because the parade sounded like a lot of fun for her 4-year-old daughter.
“Being from San Francisco, there is always something fun and exciting going on that I can take my daughter too,” Montley said. “Things like this bring a community together, and I think it is really important for Phoenix to have something like this because it promotes diversity, art and a sense of belonging for everyone that lives around here.
“My daughter is loving it so far, and if she is loving it, then I am loving it.”
Steve Venpre, 64, from Apache Junction, said he loved that the Civic Space Park hosts events like this. Venpre said he had attended many other events in the past at the park that were a lot like this one.
“Everyone should be exposed to music, art and things like this, instead of sitting at home and watching them on TV,” Venpre said.
As the event came to an end, families left with their kids, costume winners left with their trophies and community members left with a memorable night of entertainment and fun.
Contact the reporter at nkstark@asu.edu
