3 LAGUNA FESTIVALS : ART SHOWS DRAW BIGGER CROWDS

All three of Laguna Beach’s annual summer outdoor art festivals, which ended Sunday, drew bigger than average audiences, according to preliminary estimates.

Officials of the Sawdust Festival, which opened July 5, said overall attendance was about 238,000, the highest in recent years.

The older Festival of Arts and Pageant of the Masters reported a preliminary total of 220,000 paid admissions since its July 10 opening, a “few hundred persons more” than last year, according to board president John Rayment. The pageant itself--nightly “living art” tableaux spectacles in the 2,662-seat Irvine Bowl--sold out for the 21st straight summer, Rayment added.

Attendance at the Art-A-Fair Festival, which opened July 3, reached 100,000 for the first time, said president Vetold Adam. Its turnout is expected to increase markedly next summer, when the fair moves to a larger site between the Sawdust Festival and the Festival of Arts along Laguna Canyon Road, Adam said.

All three festivals offered a mix of music, dance and other performances as well as exhibits and demonstrations of paintings, sculpture, ceramics, photography and other media.