Santa Ana Seeks and Finds Trove of Artworks, Venues

An event Saturday to promote the arts drew hundreds of people who spent the day searching for the imaginative side of the city.

The Great Santa Ana Art Hunt, which was the finale in a weeklong celebration of artists who have made the city their home, gave the crowd composed mostly of Orange County residents a taste of many talents, said Gary Christensen, president of the Santa Ana Council of Arts and Culture, which organized the event using a $5,000 federal grant.

Beginning at 10 a.m., enthusiasts boarded one of four buses to several destinations that included an acting lesson at the Alternative Repertory Theatre, a peek at St. Joseph Ballet’s rehearsal and a belly-laugh from actors of the Orange County Crazies.

“This city is ripe with the arts,” he said, “and most people don’t even know about it.”

Laguna Beach usually comes to mind as the center of the county’s creative culture, Costa Mesa resident Linda Dixon said. People forget that many artists work outside of that hub, and they have just as much to offer, she said.

In the historic Santora Building, 207 N. Broadway, J. Cheryl Bookout displayed her multimedia works that depict her interpretations of boundaries, personal space and death. She said she had designed clothes in New York and Los Angeles for 10 years before “coming back to her roots in Santa Ana” a few years ago.

One of her exhibits is a three-panel fence, with the last panel dominated with black and shades of gray, signifying death, she said. Another is called “One Man’s Trash,” a painting of an aborted fetus.

Bookout was the first artist to move into the Santora Building, where luminaries such as Lucille Ball stopped for tea on her way to the coastal cities in the mid-1900s.

Candace Kooi, 43, of Santa Ana said she didn’t know there were so many artists with such cultural diversity in the city until Saturday’s event, which she attended “because of her husband.”

Although Kooi has lived in the city for 11 years, she never really thought of it as an “artsy place.” But she changed her mind when she walked into the three-story building that featured architects as well as artists, some of whom were standing in front of their easels working on their new creations.

“This is a wonderful coming-together of talents,” she said, “and I hope that it’s here to stay.”

The event also attracted many who are too young to understand the meaning of art.

Elliott Dykman, 2, of Tustin, watched with keen interest as an artist who was putting the finishing touches on a painting of a woman in red.

The boy’s father, John Dykman, said, Elliott “paints himself, and I guess he was glad to see that grown-ups do it as well.”

Dykman and his son also visited the Discovery Science Center & Launch Pad, a hands-on science center, and listened to a local band blow their horns.

“This kind of thing is vital,” said John Dykman, 40, “It makes the place more than just another city among the suburban sprawl of Orange County.”

In its first year, organizers are hoping that the Art Hunt will become an annual event to draw residents downtown and throughout Santa Ana’s visual and performance arts centers. The event culminated after years of trying to convince the city to put more effort in the arts, said Don Cribb, founder of the Council of Arts and Culture.

Cribb said: “This is a celebration of our work in the last seven years and a kickoff for the future.”