STREET ART FESTIVAL EXPECTED TO DRAW THOUSANDS BY TODAY.

Byline: ALEX DOBUZINSKIS Staff Writer

NEWHALL -- Dancers in vibrant costumes took the stage and chalk artists brought black pavement to life Saturday at the Street Art Festival.

Organizers expect thousands to turn out by the time the festival ends today. The event covers four blocks, one less than last year.

``It's more consolidated -- people get to things faster,'' said organizer Mike Fleming, a supervisor with Santa Clarita's arts and events office.

``I think this artist area is busier this year as a result,'' Fleming said, standing near a rope cordoning off the chalk paintings.

Dozens of chalk paintings covered the parking lot reserved for the artists.

One artist labored on a portrait of Wonder Woman, sketching the raven-haired hero's face with earthy red chalk.

Elsewhere, a teen whose T-shirt read ``I'm Making It Up as I Go'' drew a treasure chest, the centerpiece of a larger mosaic of pirate-themed images.

Artists knelt on strips of cardboard or thin wooden blocks to keep from smudging their work and some planned out their painting with grids.

But Christopher Linquata, 30, and his crew weren't going that route.

Instead, for their reproduction of Peter Paul Rubens' ``Daniel in the Lions' Den,'' they drew it on paper, poked holes in the paper, spread the sketch over the pavement and marked the blacktop through the holes.

``We're doing it a little different than some of the other guys -- we're doing it all at once instead of piece by piece,'' Linquata said, also noting that his crew was further along than other artists before breaking for lunch.

On the main stage on San Fernando Road, a dozen dancers with the Filipino-American Association of Santa Clarita Valley performed traditional dances.

The show ended with a performance of Tinikling, as two women in plaid dresses danced while stepping over bamboo poles and two other women knelt down to bang the poles on the stage.

Sitting in the shade of an umbrella table with her husband, Kathie Wisner enjoyed the dance and said she saw it performed decades earlier during a trip to the Philippines.

``I think this is a real good idea to do the cultural dances. And the Irish dances are going to be really cool, too,'' Wisner said.

As she spoke, girls in colorful, bell-shaped dresses with celestial designs took to the stage to perform Irish dances.

The event, which the city organized, continues from 10a.m. to 6p.m. today on San Fernando Road, between Fifth and Market streets.

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(1 -- 2) Rosedell Elementary School students, above, work on their art at the Santa Clarita Street Art Festival in downtown Newhall. At right, Chris Brake of Saugus uses chalk to create his sidewalk art. The event featured dozens of artists, professional and amateur, using the ground as their canvas.

(3 -- 4) The shadow of artist Anne Marie Darrach, above, of Valencia can be seen as she rests on her artwork at the Santa Clarita Street Art Festival in downtown Newhall on Saturday. She was one of several artists at the festival.

Alex Collins/Special to the Daily News