Artlightenment Festival Dates Extended In Response to Artist’s Request

Artlightenment takes place in November at the Church of Scientology Celebrity Centre Nashville.  This year’s festival is now extended to allow more time for visual artists.

Each November, the Artlightenment Art and Film Festival brings a modern mixture of aesthetics to Nashville.  It boasts a rich display of fashion, sculpture, paintings, photography as well as a fully-fledged film festival. It’s a fresh, eclectic mixture of popular art forms. 

The downside? The logistics involved in accommodating all of this in the space of a three-day weekend and in one location.  While the film festival has expanded year after year, visual artists notably had less and less time or space to display their works between film showings.  This led participating artist Lisa Porter to contact Artlightenment’s producer Robyn Anderson-Morshead about the situation.  Porter isn’t just an average graphic designer turned fine artist. She leads the Nashville Fine Artists meet-up group which is now 190 Nashville artists strong.

Rather than ignore Porter’s predicted plight in the upcoming 2015 festival set for November, Morshead sought to make the artist happy. In fact, the solution is to grant visual artists an entire week prior to the festival.  “This will give the artists more exposure,” says Morshead, “Artlightenment is about keeping doors open for artists.” Since its inception in 2009, the festival generally lasts 3-5 days.  With the extension, it will begin one week earlier, on Saturday night, November 7, 2015.   

Now in its seventh year, Artlightenment continues to grow and change while inviting even greater participation from the city. Even Nashville’s celebrity photographer, Raeanne Rubenstein, has become involved and allowed her photography to be viewed.  

Asked if she thinks this one-week extension is risky, Morshead responded that it is worth it to serve the participating visual artists. As it says on the website, the festival was created from Morshead’s dream to help artists by giving them a festival dedicated to no other cause than the art itself. “This is a festival about them, the artists, and what they have to say,” says Morshead.

Artlightenment’s new schedule begins at 6pm on November 7^th.  The art display will be up for one week in the festival’s location, the Church of Scientology & Celebrity Centre Nashville located in the historic Fall School Building at the corner of 8^th Ave S and Edgehill. The church has hosted the event every year in accordance with their Founder L. Ron Hubbard’s vision to help all artists.

As is custom, the film festival will run Thursday and Friday, on November 12^th and 13^th.  The festival concludes with a fashion show followed by an awards ceremony on Saturday night, November 14^th.  All are invited. For more information, visit artlightenment.com.