By Katie Gilfillan

On Saturday, November 3, artists who live in the central Florida area participated in the Fifth Annual Chalk the Walk in Central Park event in Winter Park. Sixty-six different sidewalk squares were used with up to two artists per square creating their chosen art piece with the chalk medium. The artists had from eight in the morning to three in the afternoon to complete their chalk canvas.

“This event is a street painting event where artists draw on the sidewalk with soft pastel chalk,” said Robert T. Earll Jr., the event coordinator. “We have an adult category, we have a high school category and we have a middle school category and there are categories within those. The adult and high school have best figurative portrait or master piece, best non figurative master piece, best reproduction of photograph; as long as they know who the photograph was taken by, best tribute to an artist which requires that they include three works of art in their piece and then the fifth one is an original work of art by the artist themselves.”

The artists participating in this year’s Chalk the Walk have either had experience in the previous years or it is their first time participating in the event. The majority of the artists participating are high school art students that enjoy the overall aspect and experience of what the event has to offer.

“I’ve been competing for the last four years and I started competing at a local Chalk the walk in school,” said Rachel Dauns, a high school art student at The Master’s Academy. “I was already in Art Club and I was interested in trying something new, as soon as I did it, I loved it because chalk is such an interesting medium. But it does hurt your fingers though.”