VIE Presents Le Bon Ton in Alys Beach, Florida

An artistic garden affair

VIE Presents the 2023 Digital Graffiti Festival Awards Party at Alys Beach

Dearest Reader, the VIE Team thoroughly enjoyed celebrating the intersection between past and future along with the announcement of the winners of this year’s Digital Graffiti festival at Le Bon Ton, An Artistic Garden Affair in Alys Beach, Florida, on May 19, 2023. We donned our best Bridgerton-inspired frocks and partook in sips from Gulf Water Wines and Coastal Coffee Bar Co., savory and sweet treats from The Salty Butcher and On The Fly PCB, and the musical stylings of a string quartet and pianist by Top Hat Live, aka The Whistledowns.

Grove Fisher of Fisher’s Flowers transformed the Gulf Green with her event design, and Rose & Co. added pops of color with their stunning florals. Thank you to all of our artists who turned the green into an al fresco gallery: Andy Saczynski, Lindsay Tobias, Julia Kate Mace San Juan, ADARO, Brendan Parker, and Sally Neal. A special thank you also goes to Marie Nguyen of Marie Leoni Jewelry & Gifts for styling the VIE Team with her stunning jewelry designs! Head over to VIE’s Facebook to see the full gallery of photos from the evening by Hunter Burgtorf.

Watch Le Bon Ton on Youtube

WE CONGRATULATE THE 2023 DIGITAL GRAFFITI FINALISTS AND WINNERS!

The 2023 awards include Best in Show ($5,000 prize): Holy Photons, Through the Fire to the Light; Curator’s Choice ($2,000 prize): Brittnie Diamant, Memoria Amnesia, and three Special Recognition honors (at $1,000 prize each): Peter Clark & Cody Samson, Ecotone; S4RA, privacy-GrDN.info; Jinkyu Kang, The Light. Festival winners were selected by the festival’s curator, John Colette, and an esteemed panel of judges.

Additionally, a selection of more than 55 artists from worldwide submissions displayed their works for the juried show, alongside special projects from the three residency artists, students of the Savannah College of Art and Design’s motion media design program, ASH Scholars from the University of Missouri, local students from Seaside Neighborhood School and Seacoast Collegiate High School, the Point Washington Medical Clinic, Dave King of SoWal House, and Visit Florida, using the white masonry architecture, pathways and landscape of the town as a large-scale canvas. The Alys Foundation has donated more than $200,000 in awards and artist stipends over the past 15 years, all to further facilitate and encourage digital display of art in the public realm.

The engagement between the art, architecture, and audience is transformative, creating an immersive and interactive art projection experience that is entirely unique to the Digital Graffiti festival, named as one of the top “24 Unconventional Art Destinations Around the World” by National Geographic. The audience moves throughout the festival footprint, through the streets and pedestrian paths, pocket parks and amenity spaces, engaging with the art within the context of the town’s urbanism, within the shared community experience, and within a festival environment of food, drink, and music. Digital Graffiti in Alys Beach is an authentically unique art experience.

Finalists: Tyler James Bangkok, Nicola Pavone, George Berlin, Holly Danger, Michael Betancourt, Border Williams ft. Micah Buzan, Timothy Nohe, Brandon Ellis, Christopher Farstad, David Serra Navarro, Lynn Kim, Isabel Clavo, Jean-Michel Rolland, Gary Bitsicas, Xinye Lin, Zachary Winter, Jennifer Petuch, Lori Ersolmaz, Eric Homan, Kaleb Sweeney, Jeremy Oury, Sandra Araújo, Priscilla Quek, Fumie Ito Matters, Angelica Verdan, Jinkyu Kang, Alex Campbell, Alexander Mendoza, David Bennett, Karen Brummund, Katie Rolph, Io Ermoli, Komal Goswami, Meghan Romance, Patrick Kuhnmuench, Peter Clark, Cody Samson, Ted Cobena, Jonah Allen, Candi Gordon, Elise Lyon, Brittnie Diamant, Luke Hildreth, Alyssa Mackersie, Daisy Rankin, Katherine Balsley, Nano Fantom, Tracy Miller-Robbins, Christopher DeLorenzo, Keaton Fox, Renee Silva, City University of Hong Kong Students, Savannah College of Art and Design Students, University of Missouri Students