MickeyBlog is LIVE From EPCOT’s 2024 Festival of the Arts
Today is the first official day of the 2024 EPCOT Festival of the Arts!
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EPCOT’s arts-centered festival features bright colors, food, and yes, art of all kinds of types and genres. As always, we’re visiting the festival today, and we invite you to follow along with us LIVE!
This post will be updated throughout the day, so make sure you keep checking back with MickeyBlog for more details. Let’s jump right in!
Festival Dates
The 2024 Festival of the Arts lasts from January 12 to February 19th, which gives guests a fairly limited window of time to experience it!
Combined with the typically cooler weather and smaller crowd levels following the holidays, this is one of our favorite festivals to attend.
Festival of the Arts banner
The 2024 iteration of the Festival of the Arts brings back new and returning dishes, art, and more.
EPCOT Hours
On January 12th, EPCOT will be open from 9AM to 9PM, with Early Theme Park Entry taking place at 8:30AM. (Early Theme Park Entry applies to guests staying in qualifying Disney World hotels.)
Photo: Disney
You don’t need a special ticket to attend the Festival of the Arts, but you will need a Park Reservation if you do not have a date-based ticket or you’re an Annual Passholder who wants to visit EPCOT before 2PM.
Remember, guests with date-based tickets no longer need Park Reservations, and you can Park Hop all day now with a qualifying ticket or Annual Pass!
EPCOT
Note that while EPCOT opens at 9AM (or 8:30AM for Early Theme Park Entry), the food booths typically open around 11AM. While you wait, it’s a good time to stop into Creations Shop to do some shopping!
Festival Passport
The Festival Passport is a must-have for EPCOT festival visitors! This little booklet is a free guide for everything happening during the festival — whether you want to know more about the food, artwork, entertainment, and more.
You can typically find the Festival Passport at food booths and various kiosks around EPCOT.
Festival of the Arts Festival Passport
It’s totally free and a great souvenir to take home! Inside, you’ll find information about food booths and their menus…
Festival Passport
…entertainment…
Festival Passport
…and even merchandise.
Festival of the Arts Festival Passport
While we wait for the booths to open, let’s do some shopping!
Merchandise
We headed to Creations Shop to check out the new festival merchandise. The line to get in looked like this.
Line to get into Creations Shop
This year, the merchandise includes a Figment Spirit Jersey…
Figment Spirit Jersey
…a Corkcicle Tumbler…
Corkcicle Tumbler
…this Ceramic Pencil Holder…
Ceramic Pencil Cup
…and this Festival Mug, among other merchandise.
Festival Mug
The big draws, however, were the new Figment Lug bags! There was a Crossbody Bag…
Figment Lug Bag
…and a Backpack.
Figment Lug Backpack
Check out all the new festival merchandise here!
Figment Popcorn Bucket
Another piece of iconic festival merchandise is this Figment/Imagination Pavilion Popcorn Bucket! It’s only available at Figment’s Inspiration Station at the Odyssey Pavilion, and you must purchase it via Mobile Order in the My Disney Experience app.
@mickeyblog_ The NEW Figment Bufket is officially HERE everybody!🥳💜🌈🎨✨ This years Festival of the Arts bucket celebrates Figment, the Imagination Pavilion, rainbow popcorn and even lights up!✨ What do you think?!?✨ @Disney Parks #figmentpopcornbucket #figment #figmentbucket #disneyparks #waltdisneyworld #disneyworld #disneyparks #artfulepcot #festivalofthearts #epcotfestivalofthearts ♬ original sound – Jason Alexander Pleasant
It comes with a bag of rainbow popcorn for $30, and each guest is limited to 2 buckets.
Food & Drinks
There are 16 different “food studios” (aka food booths) at the Festival of the Arts, and each one features art-inspired cuisine. We started out with some colorful eats at Figment’s Inspiration Station at the Odyssey Pavilion…
Figment’s Inspiration Station spread
…and then we went deconstructed at the Deconstructed Dish.
Deconstructed Dish spread
Be sure to check out MickeyBlog for all our booth reviews!
Wonderful Walk of Colorful Cuisine
If you want to earn a special treat, you can participate in the Wonderful Walk of Colorful Cuisine. Basically, you purchase five qualifying dishes (out of a total of six), collect a stamp for each dish, and then redeem for a free treat!
Wonderful Walk of Colorful Cuisine
The qualifying dishes are from different booths, and you collect stamps from the Cast Members at the booth during your purchase.
Wonderful Walk of Colorful Cuisine stamps
So far, we’ve collected stamps for the Blueberry-filled Pastry Tart from Figment’s Inspiration Station…
Blueberry-filled Pastry Tart
..and the Deconstructed Key Lime Pie from the Deconstructed Dish.
Deconstructed Key Lime Pie
When you collect five stamps, you can visit Deco Delights to get a free treat!
Over at Deco Delights, the prize included a Wildberry Slushy and an Art Palette Sugar Cookie!
Wildberry Slushy and Art Palette Cookie
Chalk Full of Character
There are two different scavenger hunts during the Festival of the Arts! Chalk Full of Character is a self-guided tour of Disney character chalk drawings around the World Showcase. There’s no gameboard or any official way to play — so it’s just for fun!
Chalk Full of Character
Without spoiling too much, we spotted Dante in the Mexico Pavilion…
Dante
…Bruni in the Norway Pavilion…
Bruni
…and Mushu in the China Pavilion!
Mushu
Figment’s Brush with the Masters
But if you do want to participate in an “official” scavenger hunt, you can “help Figment learn about art” with Figment’s Brush With the Masters. You CAN play without purchasing a gameboard, but if you want to earn a prize, you need a gameboard.
You can find the map and stickers at Creations Shop, Port of Entry, and World Traveler for $9.99 plus tax.
Figment’s Brush with the Masters
This scavenger hunt features Figment hiding in famous pieces of artwork around the World Showcase.
Figment as ‘The Mona Lisa’
You can opt to finish your map OR simply take it (unfinished) to World Traveler to redeem for a prize. You can redeem at any time during the festival while prize supplies last!
Artwork & Entertainment
Most of the entertainment during the Festival of the Arts is art-related, including Art Defying Gravity, Visual Art in Performance, and live music.
We’ll report back on this later today!
Festival Entertainment
You can also participate in the Animation Academy and learn how to draw a Disney character from an animator.
Animation Academy takes place in the America Gardens Theatre at 12:30PM and 1:30PM daily.
Animation Academy
There are also art-related photo ops…
Photo op in Mexico
…and chalk art for kiddos at the bridge to World Showcase Plaza from 11AM to 5PM daily.
Kids’ Chalk Art
One of our festival favorites is the Paint by Numbers Mural, which is located at the Expression Section booth.
You get paint, a brush, and an assigned number, and then you can paint a few squares of the mural to help create a piece of art!
Mural
The mural is open for artists between 11AM and 5PM daily.
Mural
You can also check out the Disney on Broadway concert series, which features songs from Disney on Broadway musicals.
Disney on Broadway
Watch our video all about the festival below!
Keep following MickeyBlog for more Disney World news!
