This past weekend, Downtown Orlando’s Immerse Fest returned to the core of the city for its 11th year displaying interactive art, live painting, and musical performances. The festival, sponsored by AdventHealth, filled downtown on Friday, Feb. 20 and Saturday, Feb. 21 from 5 p.m. to 11 p.m., and Sunday, Feb. 22 at Lake Eola for daytime fireworks.
Admission was free for guests who attended the festival for the standard experience. Tickets for those who wanted to have more of an interactive experience ranged from $20 to $180, offering perks like early access to VIP and dining experience.
On Saturday, Feb. 21, the immersive art experience started on Orange Avenue outside the Dr. Phillips Center For The Performing Arts and Orlando City Hall.
The “Art Park” sat outside the event center adjacent to the stage as inflatable cartoon-like figures filled the lawn with bright colors. Across from the lawn sat Advent Health’s Art of the Heart, a red light up frame of a heart with an empty filling where city hall could be seen right down the middle.
Traveling north on Orange Avenue, street performers, like trapeze artists, engaged in aerial arts and danced on stilts. Orlando’s Science Center drew guests to its exhibit by creating a green tornado of fire.
A couple unused, older cars were transformed into art structures before encountering the “Art Market” next to Orange Avenue. The market featured vendors selling items like paintings, jewelry, art pieces, and decorative rocks. In the street, live painting took place by artist, Ben Keller, who circled a black square canvas and spray-painted figures like Darth Vader. Inside the walls, guests had the ability to spray paint their own art.
Othervsre had an immersive virtual reality set that VIP attendees could experience by walking down a metal-gated alley with the headset on. Orlando Contra Dance played music right before Church Street where guests could participate in live dancing. On Church Street and Orange Avenue there were exhibits like “Classical Crashout” where people could gather and scream or rant in rage while classical music played over them.
At Laudanum and Ink, an immersive, sensory, and cinematic Frankenstein tale was told through the act of creation. A booth outside Laudanum and Ink called Wish You Well gave guests the option of writing a wish of theirs and putting it in a box, and taking a wish from another box before leaving.
Continuing down Orange Avenue were graffiti artworks and more interactive checkpoints for people to stop and jot their thoughts to be displayed on panels of art. Performances on stages shuffled throughout the night like South America in Motion, a multicultural performance that featured singing and dancing to celebrate the heritage of Colombia, Ecuador, Paraguay and Brazil. At the end of the street families gathered and recorded skaters doing kickflips and ollies in their own small skatepark.
From slightly before sunset to midnight, the immersive festival presented interactive, creative experiences and lit up downtown Orlando. Ten blocks of the most core part of Orlando became one of the biggest local art venues over the weekend.