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A crowd gathered under the Samoa Bridge near Halvorsen Park on Saturday afternoon to enjoy food, local vendors and music in celebration of  the latest batch of murals to decorate our town as a part of the fifth annual Eureka Street Art Festival. 

Jenna Catsos, one of the festival organizers, said that she’s thrilled with the way this year’s murals turned out. She did not yet have an idea of how many people attended today’s party, but said it seemed to be a great turnout and was excited that so many community members – vendors, volunteers and attendees – made it out to the event. 

“I would call it an unequivocal, 100 percent success,” Catsos told the Outpost during the festival on Saturday afternoon. “There’s so many different ways to measure the success of an event like this, and one of them is getting the murals on the wall. Check! A large festival event has so many moving pieces, but…everybody got down here and heard about it somehow. So I would call that a great success.” 

The Eureka Street Art Festival – a week-long event promoting public art – started in 2018, focusing on adding new murals to Old Town. Choosing a different location every year, the event has helped bring vibrant artworks to the downtown area, Henderson Center and Fourth and Fifth Streets. This year the festival featured 11 different artists from across the country and focused on the north end of Eureka, bringing art to the Waterfront Trail, the 101 corridor and to the bottom of the Samoa Bridge. 

This year’s location was suggested by the California Department of Transportation (CalTrans), which approached the festival organizers with the idea of decorating the Samoa Bridge, Catsos said. The organizers then selected a few other nearby walls and surfaces in surrounding areas to tie into the bridge murals. 

Festival organizer Jenna Catsos leads an art walk earlier this week

“I feel like this is the beginning of an incredible relationship with Caltrans,” Catsos said, adding that the festival organizers and Caltrans will likely continue their partnership when choosing locations for future festivals. 

The festival has continued throughout COVID, with the last two years including socially-distanced mural painting. But this is the first time since 2019 that the festival has included the block party event to celebrate the completion of the murals. Catsos said that the team was a little bit rusty, but because the party is held in a different location each year, there are always new logistics to figure out. She was very excited about the event being held in such a unique location this year and hopes it will be the first of many outdoor events under the Samoa Bridge. 

Catsos wanted to give a shout out to the other organizers – Swan Asbury, Economic Development Associate Planner for the City of Eureka, and Michelle Cartledge, owner of the Humboldt Cider Company – who have helped this event grow and thrive. She also wanted to thank the community for its continued support of the Eureka Street Art Festival. 

“When people come out for events, come out for the art walks, show they’re excitement on social media – that’s why we keep going,” Catsos told the Outpost. “Invest your energy and excitement into things you like in the community, because that’s why they will continue.” 

If you’re reading this post in time, the party under the bridge will continue until 6 p.m. 

Below: The Outpost’s Andrew Goff spent some time dropping by the ESAF this week and was able to snag photos of every artist participating this year. Get to know them now. 

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Need more mural imagery? Luckily for you local FAA Part 107 certified commercial drone pilot Chad Johnson made a trip to the Samoa Bridge mural landscape this week and passed along some snazzy aerial footage he took. Soar through the colors with him below.

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PREVIOUSLY: 

• (PHOTOS) 2021 Eureka Street Art Festival Artists
• (PHOTOS) 2020 Eureka Street Art Festival Artists
• (PHOTOS) 2019 Eureka Street Art Festival Artists