Oakland's Art and Soul Festival kicks off this weekend

OAKLAND, Calif. (KGO) -- A festival that is quintessentially Oakland kicks off Saturday.

Crews are downtown setting up for the Art and Soul Festival. It's a celebration of creativity with music, dance, art and local food and drinks.

Drew McGowan of championship barbecue team Smoakland said Art and Soul really highlights how exciting the city is right now.

"With everything that's going on with the food scene and the restaurant scene and the bar scene and everything thriving here in Oakland, it's so great to have people coming here to experience it first hand as part of Art and Soul," McGowan said.

Smoak-land is competing in the festival's Oaktown Throwdown, a barbecue cook-off. Art and Soul runs from noon to 6 p.m. both Saturday and Sunday.

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