COMMUNITY spirit shone at Ewyas Harold's first ever Arts Festival which was a huge success attracting hundreds of people across the three days.

Running over the Bank Holiday weekend live music, demonstrations, children's story telling and displays took place in different locations across the village.

Venues also displayed a range of art forms for sale from local artists.

Gill Jinman, Chairman of the Festival of Arts, came up with the event as a way of showcasing local talent after previously holding art exhibitions at The Temple Bar Inn.

"It was an absolutely fantastic event and the idea worked really well," said Mrs Jinman.

"The whole idea of the festival was to showcase local talent and everybody involved was from the village or had a link to the village in some way. It's amazing how many artists there are and there is an extraordinary amount of creative people in the area.

"The atmosphere was fabulous and people helped and joined together so it was a real community event."

Mrs Jinman hopes that the event can now be ran every two or three years.

What started with the local primary school running their own scarecrow competition ended in 35 scarecrows appearing in the village with shops and businesses also getting involved.

One of the talking points from the Temple Bar Inn art exhibition was a four- metre long painting titled 'Heart of the Wood' by Richard Bavin which is being sold on behalf of the Herefordshire Wildlife Trust.

The painting includes contributions from 102 people and a dog whose paw prints can be seen on the artwork. It is still for sale and for more information email: bavin@madasafish.com.