Celebration was filled with people this past weekend outside of the Doudna Fine Arts Center and Buzzard Hall even though it rained Saturday afternoon during the event.

Dan Crews, director of Doudna, said the bands still played in the rain Saturday — they were moved to inside of the Doudna concourse, which is in front of The Black Box Theatre.

“We do not stop Celebration even if it rains,” he said. “It has become a type of tradition for it to rain during the event and we do not stop the event because of it. As I say ‘rain or shine the festival will go on.’”

He said there was only one band from Chicago that was unable to make it to perform at Celebration.

“They were unable to get to Charleston on time for their performance time at the festival on Friday and they were the last performance so the bands ended a bit earlier that day,” Crews said.

Many food stands, which have been popular in past festivals on campus, returned with the same food that Crew said people liked a lot in the past.

“The food stands are a kind of staple of Celebration. Many people have told me that they are the first thing they stop at when they come,” he said.

Sunday was the busiest day of the festival this year Crew said, many faculty members, along with community members, brought along family members.

“Some even brought their pets because of how nice the weather has been,” he said.

There were many booths this year, all of the space for the booths were bought out he said. Most of the sellers are from Illinois, four of them from out of the state.

One seller, Danielle Kusman from Watseka, IL, who had a booth called “GreyHawk Forge Chainmaille Designs,” said she was told by a friend to come to the festival. “Dan Crews and I were in a bit of a ‘phone tag’ game for about a week trying to get the booth set up,” she said.

“When it was all set up, Dan told me that I got the last spot for the festival. I was pretty lucky to call at the right time.”

John Boshart, retired art professor from Eastern, was also a part of the festival. He said this was his 28 year that he was involved with Celebration.

“After I retired I told Dan Crews that I would finally have a booth at the festival,” he said. The artwork he was selling were demonstrations from his past classes. He was also selling artwork from June Cretsa, a lab school professor of Eastern, who has passed away he said.

“When we were cleaning we found a box with all of her ceramics in it. I thought that instead of throwing them away that we could sell them and put the profit from the artwork towards a scholarship fund she created to help support art students,” Boshart said. One hundred percent of the profits of the artwork are going into the student scholarships he said.

Another scholarship foundation was being raised from his booth, a scholarship to honor the art faculty member Sue Rardin, who passed away from a heart attack this spring semester. He said she was the office administrator for the department. “For 27 years I have helped Crews with coordinating all the visual arts for the festival. Now that I’m retired I said I would have a booth with some of my stuff and anything I sold would all go into the Sue Rardin fund,” Boshart said.

Stephanie White can be reached at 581-2812 or at sewhite@eiu.edu