DALLAS — Editor's Note: the video above is from September 2021 related to the festival's return that year.
A North Texas festival that's served as an annual affair around for nearly 30 years is officially ending its run, citing economic and security concerns for the decision.
After holding its most recent festival in April 2022, the Deep Ellum Arts Festival announced this weekend that the event not be coming back in 2023.
In a released statement, festival founder Stephen Millard said his team had to navigate through three consecutive pandemic-induced cancellations, and the free-to-attend art and music festival from this past spring paid for the debt built up during that time.
However, due to a lack of financial support from outside sources or investors, Millard said the festival no longer had enough money to pay for the event's run next year.
Millard further added that he would be taking on “unjustifiable personal financial and liability risks” if he were to move forward with another year of the festival, calling it “unsustainable.”
On the festival’s main website, part of the announcement said: “Our devoted production team is very proud of the positive impact we brought to the Deep Ellum community, and the opportunity to select and showcase the thousands of original performers and fine artists who were so instrumental to our overall success.”
Millard said issues related to security at major public events also played a part in the festival ending, but he didn’t go into detail in the release as to what he was referring to.
The first Deep Ellum Arts Festival was held in 1994. Millard’s company, Main Events International, produced the annual festival that regularly featured more than 100 bands, singers and artists.
Across its 28 years of existence, the festival brought in 2,500 original performers and 5,000 artists to more than two million attendees.
Along with the end of the Deep Ellum Arts Festival, Millard said he plans to retire from his 45-year career in the hospitality and major special event productions industry.