They’re doing arts, culture in Reno again

RENO -- An arts and cultural festival that began 13 years ago as an attempt to fill a tourism gap between the Reno Rodeo in June and the Hot August Nights car rally is coming of age as a key component of civic leaders' efforts to revive the city's image and restore its sense of community.

The monthlong Artown festival offers free events each day in July in a downtown park along the Truckee River as well as ticketed performances at stages and theaters by headliners including Ringo Starr, Wynton Marsalis, the Harlem Gospel Choir and the Hubbard Street Dance Chicago troupe.

Two decades ago, organizers concede, the arts would have been one of the last images to come to mind in the Biggest Little City in the World, where quarter blackjack tables and 99-cent breakfasts were the main draw for tour buses of visiting Californians.

Since then, the once garbage-strewn river that rolls through downtown has been cleaned up and is home to a world-class kayaking and tube float park. Free summer concerts are held at an amphitheater on an island in the park, and a 60,000-square-foot Nevada Museum of Art has been built just blocks away.

"This is our lucky 13th year," said Beth Macmillan, executive director of the festival.

Artown also has music, dance and opera, hands-on arts programs, film screenings and theater performances.

"It's grown in size and scope," Macmillan said. "And I think Artown continues to change the way the rest of the country sees Reno. We're using arts and culture as a tool to do that, so that people around the country will say, 'They are doing WHAT in Reno?'"

The National Endowment for the Arts, which is supporting Artown this year with a $15,000 grant, calls it "one of the most comprehensive festivals in the country."

The original event drew about 30,000 people to a three-week festival. Last year, more than 350,000 visitors attended with an estimated $15.7 million impact on the local economy.

In addition to drawing tourists, festival backers say it's been pivotal in attracting residents from suburban neighborhoods to a downtown area that flourished in the 1950s and '60s but then deteriorated.

"One of the goals of Artown is to get people to understand downtown Reno," City Councilman Dave Aiazzi said. "From the City Council's point of view, what Artown and arts and culture in general does is bring people to downtown who wouldn't normally go.

"It has been paying off with people investing their money in Reno, people wanting to live here," he said. "Go ask people why they are buying condos downtown, and they'll say they love Artown. They love the vibrance down here."

Fernando Leal, principal and managing partner of the Chicago-based L3 Development, is responsible for 380 condominiums under construction at the Montage high-rise, part of a $143 million reconstruction project at the former Flamingo Hilton Casino and Hotel.

"Events like Artown played a major role when deciding to invest in downtown Reno," Leal said. "Many of the great urban neighborhoods today throughout the country started as pockets where artistic people lived, worked and played."

Karen Craig, executive director of the 1999 festival, was one of those who acknowledged at the time that no one thought of Reno as a place to enjoy the arts.

"You do now," she said.

"Back then, all we basically had by the river was a parking gallery. The art museum was in the old Title Company building. I remember all those dirty buildings had their backs to the river," said Craig, who now works for the city's Redevelopment Agency.

Since then, the Riverside Hotel built in 1927 has been renovated into artists' lofts with a deli and restaurant on the first floor. A theater complex fronts another riverside block, and baskets full of flowers hang from streetlights on bridges and river walkways.

"Now, our riverfront is magnificent," Craig said. "It helps us be a community."