It's hard not to be caught up in the enthusiasm of Claire Halpern, Sher Hackwell and Sanya Pleshakov.

It's a sunny afternoon at Deer Lake, and they're all on the run, taking time out from organizing Burnaby's first Culture Blast festival to pause for a newspaper photo op.

But, though they're breathless from running all day, they're also smiling - and they want to make sure that everyone in Burnaby knows just how much fun the day is going to be.

Culture Blast is set for this coming Sunday, Feb. 20, from noon to 5 p.m. It's the first such festival in the city, and it's being staged with spirit funding that was made available to cultural groups thanks to the legacy of the 2010 Winter Olympics a year ago. For the first time ever, all four of the city's main cultural venues at Deer Lake - the Burnaby Art Gallery, Shadbolt Centre for the Arts, Burnaby Arts Council's Deer Lake Gallery and Burnaby Village Museum - are all taking part jointly in producing the festival.

"It's been great," says Halpern, who's coordinating the Burnaby Arts Council's end of things. "It's nice to be able to come together and offer it all on the same day."

Halpern notes that the day's events will offer something for all ages and artistic tastes, from family-focused and community-oriented right up to the avant garde.

The Burnaby Arts Council, for instance, will offer a community-oriented celebration that includes an on-site muralist, a high school quartet and art demonstrations from the Artists Helping Artists cooperative, which has an exhibition underway at the Deer Lake Gallery now. Also on site will be representatives from Stream of Dreams, giving visitors a chance to help create silver salmon that will be suspended from the trees to create a salmon "dreamworld" - a community art project that will also serve to raise awareness of the importance of the city's streams.

Down at Burnaby Village Museum, meanwhile, the focus is on family-friendly fun with a Carnivale/Mardi Gras theme.

The carousel will be open, and there will be free craft activities for kids, as well as a mask-themed scavenger hunt. There will be a variety of musical performers on site - including a Peruvian group and a Dixieland band - as well as an interactive drumming workshop.

"We have a lot of volunteers, and teen volunteers especially, who are really excited about this event," notes Pleshakov. "This is a really good event for us to engage with all our younger volunteers."

Shadbolt Centre, meanwhile, will play host to a variety of performers - including CircusWest, Colours of Dance Chinese Dancers, HZ Ballet Classique, the Josie deBaat Polynesian Dancers, Showstoppers song and dance troupe and more.

There will also be a variety of workshops and hands-on activities, including a Clay-munity Spirit Project that gives people a chance to contribute clay pieces to an art display, and an audience participation salsa dance demonstration. A mini film-festival from 1 to 4 p.m. will feature video performance art and some cutting-edge films from Burnaby North, Burnaby South, Burnaby Mountain and Byrne Creek secondary schools.

The Burnaby Art Gallery will be the venue for some more contemporary and avant-garde art, including performance artist Rebecca Belmore, who will create a new site-specific work for the gallery's front lawn.

"Working with Burnaby Art Gallery allows us to push the artistic boundaries a bit," Halpern noted.

Burnaby Art Gallery will also host a showcase of artists from its art rental and sales program, with watercolour demonstrations by James Mah and linocut demonstrations by Susan Gransby. All four venues will be busy with activities, demonstrations and performances throughout the day - for full details and a schedule of events, check out the website at www.cultureblast.org.

Halpern notes that, with so much on offer, there will be something to appeal to everyone, and she's hoping to see a large crowd turn out for Culture Blast throughout the day.

"That's the part of the Culture Blast that makes it great," she says, "There's something for everybody."