Dark Backdrop

No sooner had Grace Boyd stepped inside Exhibit 2000 at the Festival of Arts that she made a beeline for a favorite display: the silk scarves hand-painted by James Nussbaum.

With a dramatic flourish, she threw one of the colorful artworks around her neck, preened in a full-length mirror and said, “I’ll take it!”

Then she was off to another of her favorite spots at the 68-year-old Laguna Beach art show: the hand-woven stoles and capes of Louise C. Benton.

“Every year, this is my indulgence--to buy myself something special from these artists,” said Boyd, widow of William “Hopalong Cassidy” Boyd.

Boyd, a resident of Monarch Beach, was among 3,000 people who attended the preview party Saturday night that launched the annual Festival of Arts on the grounds at Irvine Bowl.

Besides the chance to purchase the original works by 160 of Orange County’s most-accomplished artists, attendees at the black-tie optional affair sampled appetizers from area restaurants and tapped their toes to the sounds of a band. The backdrop to the festivities: talk among artists about the event’s possible move to San Clemente.

The art displayed on the canyon park site, also home to the Pageant of the Masters, included paintings, sculpture, photography, ceramics, stained glass, hand-crafted furniture, model ships and scrimshaw.

“I paint all year to prepare for this show,” contemporary abstract artist Terry Manchester said. “This show [open to the public through Sept. 3] is a boost for artists. It’s our little gallery for the summer. We get to leave our art here, sell on our own, meet new people and enjoy the wonderful Laguna Beach surroundings.”

The buzz among the artists: the proposal by the festival board to move the show from its 5.6-acre location in Laguna Beach to a 20-acre spot at the Talega development in San Clemente. Festival operators have clashed with the city of Laguna Beach over how much rent the festival must pay and who will control money set aside for improving the aging festival grounds. The festival’s lease on its current site expires in September 2001.

“My feeling is that the festival belongs here--though I am open to other possibilities,” said Manchester, a Corona del Mar resident whose works have been represented in the show for the last eight years. “Laguna Beach is the home of the Festival of Arts. The majority of the artists want to stay--this is like a second home to us in the summer, a livelihood.”

Traditional photographer Dianne Reardon of Laguna Niguel, vice president of the committee to keep the festival in Laguna Beach, used one of her pieces to express her feelings about the board’s proposal.

Titled “Shameless,” the black-and-white photograph shows a headless figure sitting in a chair. “This is my interpretation of what’s occurring in the festival with the attempted hijacking by the board to take our festival to San Clemente,” Reardon said. “The board is shameless about it and won’t show their faces.”

Impressionist Michael Obermeyer echoed the comments of Manchester and Reardon: “This show should stay in Laguna Beach, where it belongs, where it’s been for nearly 70 years.”

Ceramist Walter Reiss, whose works generally “make statements about political situations,” has already conceived a work he will showcase at next year’s festival.

“It’s going to be a big wall piece titled ‘The Last Supper’--one of the paintings regularly portrayed in the Pageant of the Masters,” he said. “The central figure will be the founder of the festival back in the ‘30s. A saying on the piece will read, ‘Seven of you will betray me.’ I guess that makes my position pretty clear.”

Ann Conway can be reached at (714) 966-5952 or by e-mail at ann.conway@latimes.com.