Street-Painting Festival Slated

“I Madonnari,” an Italian street-painting festival, will be held Memorial Day weekend, May 28-30, at the Santa Barbara Mission. Kurt Wenner and Manfred Stader, winners of European street-painting competitions, will be featured.

The festival will be open to 100 artists and 100 children who will create more than 150 chalk street paintings on the plaza in front of the mission.

Wenner and Stader will create their world-acclaimed realistic works of art at the base of the mission steps. The rest of the plaza will be divided into squares to be chalked by the other participants. In 1983 Wenner, who grew up in Santa Barbara, became the first American to win the primo premio, the international street-painting trophy; he won the title for a second time in 1986.

This second annual street-painting festival is expected to attract more than 15,000 visitors. The producer is the Children’s Creative Project to benefit the arts in education programs of 40 Santa Barbara County elementary schools. Phone (805) 963-8684 for further information.