Seattle's Giant Magnet festival to call it quits after this year

This spring's Giant Magnet festival, an array of international arts performances aimed at young audiences, will be the last.

According to board president Teresa Gallo, the nonprofit Giant Magnet (formerly the Seattle International Children's Festival) is not in financial arrears.

"We have just looked at our ability to continue with our mission, to continue bringing high-quality international performers to this community," Gallo said. "We're looking at positioning, relevancy, how we find the support to continue at the level we have been.

"We just couldn't see how we could continue to do the festival without risking building a very large deficit [in the future]."

Gallo noted that one pressing difficulty is transportation. The festival relies on school districts to bus in students to the event, held at Seattle Center and in Tacoma. With education cutbacks and rising gas prices, that is becoming more difficult.

Another concern, she said, is scheduling. "The festival is in May, and that's right in the middle of state-mandated testing in the schools."

Giant Magnet sent a recent letter to donors encouraging them to contribute to the 2011 fest (featuring acts from China, Ecuador, India and Tasmania) as a way of honoring the event's 25-year history.

"In a quarter of a century, we've reached 750,000 children with acts from 200 countries," Gallo said. "We just decided we're going to go out on that note."

Giant Magnet stirred a controversy in 2009, when the board suddenly fired Executive Director Andrea Wagner and replaced her with the festival's co-founder and former director, Marilyn Raichle.

Raichle is overseeing the 2011 festival, which takes place May 10-14 in Seattle, and May 16 in Tacoma.

Information: 206-684-7338 or www.giantmagnet.org.

Misha Berson: mberson@seattletimes.com