Festival showcases talent from local female artists

As the music of Sarah’s Swing Set reverberated through Fountain Square Mall, adults admired the arts and crafts of the Luna Festival while children clutched ice cream. Both wore smiles as they explored booth after booth.

Saturday was the third annual Luna Festival presented by Women Inspire, a Bloomington organization that brings women together to highlight their different talents.

“It’s in the same vein as the festival,” said Loni Dishong, director and founder of Women Inspire. “We’re trying to make this the premier festival for women in central and southern Indiana. There’s really nothing else like it in terms of variety and richness of talented women.”

Women Inspire has no affiliation with any religious or political entity, simply a love for diversity and education, Dishong said.

Though the festival did not occur in 2010 due to a lack of a venue, the 2011 event featured new highs for both vendor and performer numbers. There were 88 vendors and 17 performers at the festival. The vendors featured designers, advocates, artists and various other trades, while the music of the performers ranged from tribal to blues.

Bloomington resident Christi Holliday attended the festival and said, “I thought this was an excellent venue for both artists and craft persons to share their talents and wares.”

She and two friends from out of town bought tea, potholders, and chocolate and caramel creams. One friend, Lee Annis, said he particularly enjoyed the creams, but thought the festival was all-around great.

“It has that small town charm but a collection worthy of a big city,” he said.

The organization participates in many community outreach programs but Luna is its largest public program of the year.

The Middle Way House was an obvious choice to appear at the festival due to their work with domestically abused women, Middle Way kitchen assistant and caterer Karli Mills said.

“We do a lot of luncheons and catering with our food, so they said we were one of their first calls to work the second floor food,” Mills said.

While this year’s was in June, next year the festival will make a return to its April origins in order to include students as well. Dishong said she’s excited to bring more people into the fold of the festival and to Women Inspire as a whole.

“We teach each other, learn from each other, inspire each other,” she said. “We want to give everyone a chance to shine.”