Bigfork packed for annual festival

By ALEX STRICKLAND / Bigfork Eagle

Electric Avenue in downtown Bigfork teemed with crowds over the weekend as vendors and browsers gathered to celebrate the 30th annual Bigfork Festival of the Arts.

The weather was perfect and parking proved to be not too much of an issue for the weekend event, which showcased artists and craftsmen — and cooks — from all over the area.

"Everything just clicked," said Bigfork Chamber of Commerce Director Bruce Solberg, who helped organize the event.

"I think it was the biggest I have seen in my three years," he said. "The vendors were pleased and a lot of local food places had record days."

Hayley Nolte and her husband Scot Ray were in town from Phillipsburg selling mirrors, coat racks and ket racks made from almost entirely recycled tin.

Nolte, originally from South Africa, said everything but the copper accents on their work was taken from old cookie tins, coffee cans or even beer cans, giving their products a very "green" aspect from all the recycling.

"We hike around Phillipsburg looking for the rusty beer cans," she said.

And how does a young couple in Montana come up with enough old cookie tins to fuel their artwork?

Nolte said a Phillipsburg man had been collecting tins for 40 years and had amassed about 4,000. Ray's mother-in-law happened to hear about them before he took them to the dump so now the pair has a nearly endless supply.

"We were ecstatic," she said.

There was no shortage of nearly anything for the festvities, including entertainment, capped by performances from the AcenDance Project out of San Francisco. The group put on three shows on both days, showcasing their unique blend of climbing and dancing on mobile climbing walls erected in front of Brookie's Cookies.

"It had people mesmorized," Solberg said.

The group's founder, Isabel von Rittberg, said she brought the group to tiny Bigfork because her grandmother Betty Wetzel lives here and "she couldn't come see it, so we brought it to her."