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Artists can't actually paint the streets of Worcester on First Night without having to dodge snowplows or some other weather-related badness. But street painters will gather Dec. 31 nevertheless, perhaps as many as 100 of them. They will just ply their street art skills inside the climate-controlled DCU Center instead.
Under the direction of noted street painter Tracy Lee Stum of California, an indoor street art festival will be a highlight of First Night, using pastel chalk as the medium and the DCU floor as a canvas.
Stum, known for producing stunning 3-D effects in her chalk paintings, will teach street painter wannabees her techniques at workshops this weekend at Worcester Art Museum. She will later return to town to orchestrate the large street-painting fest at the DCU on First Night. You can take a workshop either day and then, if you choose, also sign on for the First Night fun (although it's not required.)
Stum is a madonnari, a street painter who draws on a tradition, rooted in 16th-century Italy, of itinerant artists who traveled from town to town beautifying streets and public squares with temporary images, often of the Madonna (hence their name). The practice has been revived in recent...