On Saturday, Open Space Event Studios will serve as the gathering point for a unique happening in the Maker’s District of Bend — Beltane: Art. Music. Magic.

Beltane, also known as May Day, was an ancient Celtic holiday observed by pagans and wiccans as recently as the 19th century in Ireland, according to brittanica.com.

As music booker Amy Bathen, one of the organizers of Saturday’s event, put it in an email to this reporter, Beltane is “a fire festival celebrated at the midway point between the Spring Equinox and Summer Solstice. It is a time to honor the coming of summer, fertility, creativity, and rebirth. This year’s event will stoke the fires of our inner artists and magic weavers, and feature live music, art installations, and interactive magic spells and rituals.”

And as she said on the phone, the event, in its second year, is for everyone to celebrate. The focal point is on community rather than commerce.

The fun starts at 6 p.m. and lasts till midnight, per the Beltane ticketing page. In its second year, the occasion brings together artists, musicians and makers. The event, is the brainchild of Greg Bryce of the blues band Blackflowers Blacksun, playing at Saturday’s event along with Americana band Huck Finn Yacht Club and thrashgrass act Jackrat.

This year will have a bigger witches and wiccan component than last year, according to Bryce. Folks including Sharon Balsamo, who identifies as a witch, as well as The People’s Apothecary will have the magic portion of the event covered, with potions and tinctures on hand to usher in spring.

Becoming a witch

After getting her first tarot card deck at age 13, Balsamo became interested in the craft of magic. That was in the 1990s, when films like “The Craft” and “Practical Magic” further stirred her interest, but she ran into judgmental people who told her she was going to hell.

“So I kind of tucked it away, for a long, long time,” she said. “I would still read tarot, and I was a very spiritual person. I was always on a spiritual path. But for a long time, I just struggled with how I identified.”

Finally, in 2017, Balsamo attended a witch camp in Washington.

“It was there that I really started really learning about witchcraft and magic. I realized that I had been doing it all along, intuitively,” she said. For example, when she would quilt, she would listen to certain music and watch certain films to infuse the quilt with the energy she wanted for the person she was quilting it for.

“It’s just about really bringing intention into the physical realm, so it was very natural for me to step into that name, I guess, that identity of ‘Oh, this is what makes sense to me,’” she said. “What I like about it is it’s really personal. It’s not something that there’s an overarching authority to tell you what a witch is, what magic is, how to practice.”

Witchcraft is also customizable based on one’s interests and strengths, she said.

“It’s very individualized based on what resonates for you,” said Balsamo, who in 2021 published the book “Deeper Magic: Crafting a Meaningful & Spiritual Life.”

Specialties include kitchen witches, who practice their magic through food. There are plant witches, who find their magic in plants and herbalism. Balsamo is a few types of witches, including a kitchen witch.

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“I do whisper intentions into my soups and teas, and I knead love into bread” — but she’s primarily a hedge witch, she said.

“The idea is they ride the liminal space between the physical and the spiritual realms,” she said. “We do that through meditation and through altered states of consciousness. I do holotropic breathwork. It is a way of cultivating an altered state of consciousness. Dreamwork, as well, is a part of that.”

The practice of hedge witchcraft is about connecting with her interior realm, she said.

“For me it’s just a way to make sense of the world,” Balsamo said. “It’s very Jungian.”

Witches of Central Oregon

Central Oregon is home to a healthy population of witches, some who prefer the company of others, a coven if you will, and some who practice in a more solitary fashion. As Balsamo noted, the Witches of Central Oregon Facebook group boasts 1,200 members.

Saturday will offer a chance for them to convene alongside the poets, artists, musicians and others that will be on hand.

The People’s Apothecary, a Bend store that supports magic, herbalism and the healing arts, will be “making special tinctures and elixirs that are really honoring the energy of spring,” Balsamo said.

“I think there’s a lot of misconception that witchcraft and magic is about manipulation and control, when, really it is about relationships. It’s about working with the spirit of the plants to nourish our bodies,” she said.

“Things that are growing and blooming at this time of year … you’re tapping into the energetic frequency of these plants. The medicine of these plants. It’s about a relationship with them. It’s about a co-creation. It’s about intention.”

If You Go

What: Beltane: Art. Music. Magic.

When: 6 p.m. to midnight Saturday

Where: Open Space Event Studios, 220 NE Lafayette Ave., Bend

Cost: $20

Contact: bendticket.com