Brushes and batons
The Vancouver Arts & Music Festival returns Friday through Sunday to Esther Short Park at Sixth and Esther streets in downtown Vancouver with award-winning musicians, visual artists and performers. The event offers three stages, juried art shows, pop-up galleries, dance performances, family activities, food vendors and three concerts by the Vancouver Symphony Orchestra. Activities include vendor booths, art demonstrations and an interactive art piece. Children will enjoy caricature artists, doodle walls, roaming entertainers, face painting, balloon art and lawn games. Visit Artists Alley between Vancouver City Hall and the Hilton Vancouver Washington on Sixth Street. Learn more at vancouverartsandmusicfestival.com.
Costumes and comics
Camas Comic Con First Friday is 5 to 8 p.m. Friday in downtown Camas. The event celebrates comics, sci-fi, cosplay, anime and fantasy. Come dressed as characters from Marvel, DC, anime, Harry Potter, Disney, Ghostbusters, Star Trek, Star Wars, Transformers or Mario, to name a few. If you are a fan of it, it counts! Enjoy comic art demonstrations, fandom pin trading, photo ops, Ghostbusters slime making, wandering cosplayers and a “Fandom Fun!” passport activity throughout downtown businesses. Collectible lanyards will be given to the first 300 people to check in. Get more details at downtowncamas.com/event/camas-comic-con/.
Road show
The 21st annual King’s Kruz-In is 8 a.m. to 1 p.m. Saturday at Glenwood Community Church, 12201 N.E. 72nd Ave., Vancouver. Registration ($20 per vehicle) is 8 to 10:30 a.m. The show features 300 of Portland and Clark County’s finest hot rods and custom cars, live bluegrass music, a barbecue lunch and a snack bar. Kids will enjoy a visit from a balloon artist and Woody the Magic Guy. Car show entrants receive a free lunch and a dash plaque. Twenty-one trophies will be awarded, including Best of Show. Proceeds support Options360 Women’s Clinic. Attendees should bring nonperishable food donations for FISH of Vancouver. To register, visit glenwoodcc.org.
Trouble in River City
Journey Theater presents “The Music Man,” with shows Friday through Aug. 10 at the Joyce Garver Theater, 1500 N.E. Garfield St., Camas. The Tony Award-winning musical comedy follows fast-talking traveling salesman Harold Hill as he cons the people of River City, Iowa, into buying instruments and uniforms for a boys’ marching band that he vows to organize — despite the fact that he doesn’t know a trombone from a treble clef. Before he can skip town with the cash, he falls for Marian the librarian, who transforms him into a respectable citizen by curtain’s fall. Shows are 7 p.m. Friday, Saturday and Aug. 9. Matinees are 2 p.m. Saturday and Aug. 10. Tickets are $26 for adults and $22 for children and seniors. All tickets are $2 more at the door. Buy tickets at journeytheater.org.
