Beaufort Kaleidoscope is back in town

While the Beaufort Film Festival remains the heart of the Beaufort Kaleidoscope festival, which takes place this weekend in Beaufort, the four-day event is more than a celluloid parade.

That's why organizers went with the fancy name and all.

Billed as a festival of "film, food and fine art," Kaleidoscope, which kicked off last night and runs through Sunday, features an art walk, an art exhibit, an animation workshop, a walking tour, various parties and gourmet food and -- oh yeah -- the film festival.

With so much going on, there's bound to be some overlap. The film festival kicks off at Lady's Island Cinemas at 10 a.m. today and continues until around 11 p.m. That puts it in competition with the art walk, which runs from 5 to 7:30 p.m. Catherine Hipp, tourism marketing manager for the Beaufort Regional Chamber of Commerce, hopes that with proper planning, festival participants can take in all of the events with little inconvenience.

"There's only going to be one film shown during that period," Hipp said about the art walk overlap. "It's unfortunate we can't not do one. But the way we look at it, for the most part, you have the people that want to just go see the art OR just see the films. You do have the people who want to do both -- but they're only missing the possibility to see one film."

Thirteen galleries in downtown Beaufort are participating in the art walk, which will feature more than 500 local and regional artists. In addition, John Villani, author of "The 100 Best Art Towns in America," will participate in the walk and the "Big Chill" party -- a meet-and-greet for artists, filmmakers and festival participants -- which kicks off at 9 p.m. tonight at 601 Bay St. Villani also will be honored by the Guild of Beaufort Galleries during Saturday's award banquet at Habersham.

"(The Guild is) really excited he's going to be here all weekend," Hipp said.

Habersham will host two events Saturday. During the day, Habersham Land Co. will host an art show from noon until 5 p.m. Artists in all mediums will be on display, as will the music of guitarist Chris Paul.

Last year, Kaleidoscope featured more of a "foodie" presence, which has been cut back this weekend to one event: the Awards Evening at Habersham, which starts at 6 p.m. It will feature chefs from area restaurants serving gourmet food and wine. Hipp said scaling back the "food" portion of the Kaleidoscope was just a matter of prioritizing.

"I think it was really, really hard for the chefs, and busy," she said. "We know the film festival was a huge hit, and maybe in the future the wine dinners will come back and possibly the 'Iron Chef' event. This year it just didn't work out for a number of reasons. The film really is taking off and the art has become a huge part too, so I really don't think the weekend is any less busy because of that."

The weekend wraps up Sunday with art galleries opening from noon to 4 p.m. and a concert by the USAF Rhythm In Blue Jazz Ensemble at 5:30 p.m. at Henry C. Chambers Waterfront Park.

'Hopefully it will evolve'

Beaufort Kaleidoscope, now in its second year, was launched in 2007 to help draw attention to Beaufort for prospective filmmakers and to help launch the careers of the next generation. And while it's still early in the process, Hipp has already seen some results.

"We have had people who have contacted us from the festival, from people who have had screenplays that are being made into movies, who said that they're still thinking about Beaufort for their movie," she said. "But nothing concrete has come out of it. But hopefully it will evolve, and in the future we will see evidence of the festival playing a role in getting the film industry back to Beaufort."