When a Festival Becomes a Sketchbook

Most festivals leave behind photographs.

This one left behind drawings.

During the Sol Multicultural Music Festival at the Sherman Campus Jewish Community Centre, artist Andrey Shmatnik sat in the audience and filled pages of his sketchbook as the performances unfolded around him. Choirs sang, musicians played, conductors moved through the air, and somewhere between one piece and the next, watercolour portraits of the festival began to emerge.

What makes these sketches special is their immediacy. They are not polished promotional images created weeks later. They were born in the middle of the event, while the music was still echoing through the hall.

Looking through the pages feels like walking through the festival itself. A Slovenian choir appears in shades of red. Klezmer musicians come alive through quick expressive lines. A Belarusian tsimbaly performance is captured in a few confident strokes. A string orchestra shares the page with a live painter creating yet another artwork inside the same event. Even a sound meditation for peace becomes part of the visual record.

The festival was built around multicultural dialogue through music, but these sketches reveal something deeper. Creativity was not confined to the stage. It moved freely through the room, inspiring new forms of expression wherever it landed.

Perhaps that is the true measure of a successful cultural festival. Not how many performances took place, but how many new ideas were sparked because people gathered together.

The sketches also carry a quiet connection to the venue itself. As Andrey noted, the Sherman Campus Jewish Community Centre was a project that consumed several stressful years of work. Now, instead of construction plans and deadlines, the space is filled with music, audiences, and artists drawing for the simple pleasure of being present.

A choir sings.

An artist sketches.

Someone else listens.

And a community begins to take shape.

The Sol Festival exists for only a few days each year, but thanks to these pages, some of its spirit remains long after the final applause.