Snapshots from the 9th annual Berkshires Arts Festival

This morning turned out to be a gorgeous day for a drive, so I buzzed down to Great Barrington, Mass., to scope out the 9th Annual Berkshires Arts Festival at the base of Ski Butternut on Route 23.

A whopping 185 artists have turned out for the event, which runs July 2-4, setting their wares at pop-up kiosks and mini galleries in a veritable bazaar of art and craft of every sort imaginable: pottery, paintings, works in glass, metal, wood, and fabric; basketry; etchings; jewelry; functional items such as wooden kitchen tools and hand-carved hunting and fishing knives; garden sculpture; artisanal foodstuffs; even hand-crafted canoes and miniature musical intruments.

The talent hails from about thirty-two U.S. states plus Canada; about 10 to 20 percent of artists are Berkshire-based. Most are on hand to chat about their work and some spend their time toiling away on new pieces from beneath the shade of their tents.

New this year is the Insider Art Fair, a makeshift gallery in the Lower Lodge, featuring original paintings and photography and watercolor prints from ten Berkshire artsts. (A marketing maven confides that all of 'em were sourced via Facebook--so, clearly, this isn't your grandma's craft fair!)

A new Art of Clay tent allows guests to watch live potter's-wheel demonstrations and sustaninable timber-framing workshops are ongoing courtesy the Heartwood School of Timber Framing in Washington, Mass.

The festival, which runs through July 4, expects to draw upward of eight thousand visitors

See more photos from the Berkshires Arts Festival on our Facebook page!