Festival favourites grow and diversify

In the eight years of the Festival of Glass, several features have become firm favourites, each one growing and becoming more diverse each year.

The Expo - Sunday 18 February, 10.00am - 4.00pm Christian College, Drysdale.

The Expo is the heart of each year’s Festival of Glass and the Festival’s eight years have seen it grow and diversify steadily. Festival organisers expect the 2018 Expo to attract 4,000 to 5,000 visitors, drawn by a record number of stalls featuring glass art, sculpture, jewelry, mosaics and home ware.

Several Expo exhibitors will demonstrate various glass working techniques and the Festival’s 2018 Artist in Residence, Mauro Vianello, will blow and sculpt glass and talk about his life as a glass master on the island of Murano, in Venice.

Several Expo exhibitors and Mauro Vianello will run classes after the Expo, where complete beginners can try their hand at glass art while experienced glass artists can refine and develop their skills under the tuition of specialists.

The Glass Art Awards – 2018 winners announced at the Festival Expo.

Each year, the entries to the Awards grow steadily each year in numbers and diversity. This is especially true of entries for the Bella Wein Award, which is sponsored by the Clifton Springs and Curlewis Lions Club. This Award is for the entry that captures best the character of the Bellarine Peninsula. (“Bella Wein” is the original Wathaurong name for the area.)

The Treasure Hunt – grand draw at the Festival Expo

In just three years, the Treasure Hunt has captured the imaginations of businesses and Treasure Hunters across the North Bellarine. For the 2018 Treasure Hunt, Diane Schofield’s team visited virtually every business in the area, inviting each one to participate. They were met with warm welcomes from past participants and quizzical curiosity from potential ones. As a result, a record 32 businesses are participating in the 2018 Treasure Hunt and have commissioned dozens of glass art prizes, which are on display in their premises.

Featured Festival of Glass sponsor: Clifton Springs and Curlewis Lions Club

Building communities through good practice

Lions Clubs aim to promote understanding, good government and good citizenship and to encourage people to serve their community. For many years, the Clifton Springs & Curlewis Lions Club has supported the Festival of Glass and the Festival Committee is very grateful to for their support. The Lions’ support has been an excellent example of service to community. They’ve been a major element of each Festival Expo; they help to set up and take down the venue and their sausage sizzle tent keeps Expo visitors fed and watered.

Since 2016, the Clifton Springs & Curlewis Lions Club have sponsored the Festival's "Bella Wein" award - part of the Festival's annual Glass Art Awards. The Bella wein Award is worth $500 and goes to the piece of glass art that best interprets the identity of the Bellarine Peninsula. The Award celebrates the continuity between the past and the present - "Bella Wein" is the name given to the Peninsula by the area's original owners, the Wathaurong people.

Featured Festival of Glass sponsor: Bayshore Electrical and Air Conditioning
Bayshore Electrical and Airconditioning services the Bellarine Peninsula and surrounds. Steve has supported the Festival of Glass for several years as a sponsor of the Festival's Glass Art Awards and the Festival committee is very grateful to him.
Contact Steve: Tel. 0400 201 396   Web site: http://bayshore.net.au  
 

Thanks to the City of Greater Geelong and the Bendigo Bank, our Awards sponsors, our Treasure Hunt sponsors and other local ‘in kind’ supporters.

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