The 40th annual Cherokee Triangle Art Fair will be on Saturday, April 30, and Sunday, May 1, from 10 a.m.to 6 p.m. both days. That’s the weekend before this year’s Kentucky Derby.

The Cherokee Triangle Art Fair is a juried fair with more than 200 artists’ booths. The two-day event is free and open to the public. The Art Fair is held in Louisville’s historic Cherokee Triangle neighborhood on tree-lined Cherokee Parkway between Willow Avenue and Cherokee Road adjacent to the Gen. John Breckinridge Castleman statue. Access to the long-running event adjacent to Cherokee Park will be easier this year because the Derby Festival’s mini-marathon and marathon both have been rerouted away from the fair area.

This year’s participants include Art Fair veterans as well as new artists from the Louisville area, from Kentucky, and from out of state. Art Fair patrons can view and purchase original art and often meet and talk with the artists. Fairgoers can enjoy food, drink, entertainment and music. On Saturday evening, music and food service will continue until 8 p.m.

Other attractions of the fair include the plant booth with a lush variety of plants and herbs, the Cherokee Triangle Association booth with offerings of items with the Cherokee Triangle logo, and the popular Children’s Tent with a variety of activities.

“Juicy Lucy, the Blowin’ Hot Rod” will be on hand, too. Juicy Lucy, a brainchild of Louisville’s Glassworks, is the first mobile glassblowing studio of its kind. Artists will do glassblowing demonstrations, and the members of the public will also have the opportunity to try their hand at blowing glass themselves with the assistance of Glassworks artists.

The annual Cherokee Triangle Art Fair is the major fundraiser for Louisville’s Cherokee Triangle Association, and the event’s proceeds are returned to the community and neighborhood in numerous ways. Annually, the Cherokee Triangle Association uses proceeds from the fair, along with other revenue sources, to help fund summer concerts in Willow Park, to maintain the General Castleman statue and its landscaping, and to make donations to the Highlands/Shelby Park branch of the Louisville Free Public Library, the Highlands Communities Ministries, and to the Olmsted Parks Conservancy.

Art Fair proceeds also fund the Cherokee Triangle Association web site, (www.cherokeetriangle.org), and the quarterly Cherokee Triangle Newsletter. In the past, proceeds from the Art Fair have helped provide funding for the creation and publication of a history book by Sam Thomas entitled, Cherokee Triangle, A History of the Heart of the Highlands, which will be available for purchase in the CTA booth during the fair. Members of the recently formed Tree Committee of the Cherokee Triangle Association, whose responsibility is to plant and maintain trees and to assist property owners in appropriate tree selections, will also be at the Association booth to provide information.

In an Art Fair-related event, on Friday evening, April 29, the Legal Aid Society will hold its eighth annual Art Fair preview party fundraiser, the “Brush, Bottle, and Barrel of the Bluegrass,” at Louisville Collegiate School from 5:30 p.m. to 8:30 p.m. in Collegiate’s Mary Rodes Lannert Athletic Center. Fifteen artists participating in the Cherokee Triangle Art Fair will display and sell selected art at this preview party. In 2010, over 550 people attended and raised more than $50,000 for Legal Aid.

The adjunct event also features tastings of Kentucky wines, bourbons, and beers, a silent auction, and food. Collegiate is located at 2427 Glenmary Avenue, near Grinstead Drive, in Louisville. Tickets are $75 and may be purchased in advance or at the door. To purchase tickets in advance, visit www.laslou.org or call (502) 584-1254. Free valet parking is available.

Setup for the Cherokee Triangle Art Fair begins on Friday, April 29, and the streets of the Art Fair and immediate surrounding area will be closed to through traffic Friday morning and will reopen to traffic at 8 p.m. Sunday evening after the shutdown and cleanup following the Art Fair.

Adding another dimension of “green” to the springtime Cherokee Triangle Art Fair, there is a major emphasis on recycling. Art fair volunteers have been recycling for more than a decade. Workers recycle glass, plastic, paper, cardboard, and some aluminum. The group purchased bins from Louisville’s Operation Brightside in order to make the recycling emphasis more obvious to Art Fair attendees. Recyclables collected during the Art Fair’s weekend run typically constitute two heaping truckloads of materials.

For the safety of all patrons, the Art Fair is a pet-free zone. Attendees are asked to leave their pets at home. Art fair organizers also request there be no skateboards, skates, or rollerblades, and that cyclists walk their bikes within the Art Fair. Close-in parking for the handicapped is available.

To volunteer, please contact Jerry Lyndrup at 502.451.3534.