The kite-flying festival takes place July 11 and 12 at Brenton Point State Park in Newport.

The Providence Journal / Connie Grosch

NEWPORT -- Some cultures have used kites in battle. Others fly kites to be closer to heaven.

Thousands of people are expected to watch hundreds of kites flying over Brenton Point State Park, Saturday and Sunday as the Newport Kite Festival (newportkitefestival.net) returns to the park’s lush lawn and brisk breeze along Ocean Drive.

Scott Weider of Coventry, a national champion in several kite flying disciplines, is one of the organizers. He says the festival, launched in 1986, will be a celebration, not a competition. However, many of the flyers at the event are among the country’s top competitors. They are coming to the festival from all over the East Coast, from as far away as Florida.

Weider says they will bring large fighting kites from Japan and smaller ones that originated in India, and festival visitors will have an opportunity to fly the Japanese kites with experts. Wind and weather permitting, there will be art kites, fabric sculptures that hover overhead. Power kites, the predecessors of surf kites, will pull vehicles. Candy kites will drop sweets to kids. Kids will race against one another with kites harnessed to them. And individual flyers and teams will perform to music.

Glenn Davison, another of the festival’s organizers, designs and displays kites, and is a Japanese Rokkaku battle-kite champion. He also builds and flies miniature kites (miniatures.kitingusa.com) including a 3/4-inch model. He will fly some of them at the festival.

There will be a sound tent with flyers acting as announcers to explain the activities and kites on the field. “We want the show to be informative,” Weider says.

Last weekend, many of the pros were rehearsing and demonstrating at Brenton Point. Ron Kitt, the owner of Kitt Kites, was selling kites at his vendor tent, and Weider was offering free flying lessons to anyone who asked.

The spectacle was stunning as hundreds of families observed Independence Day at the park with scores of kites overhead. And Weider says there will be even more kites, flyers and observers when the kite festival opens Saturday and Sunday from 10 a.m. to 5 p.m.

Flyers say kites are transcendental. “You put up a kite, you release all your negative energy,” says Weider. “It’s like having a bird listening to your mind through practiced hands.”

Mike Dioguardo of Easton, Mass., says he gave up golf after learning to fly kites. He drives to Brenton Point every weekend to fly with his friends.

Kites will be sold at deep discounts during the festival, Weider says, and manufacturers’ representatives will provide demonstrations and flying lessons.

Some sport kites, like Dioguardo’s, cost several hundred dollars. He also flies an art kite, created by a Mexican designer, which costs about $300. On his Web site, kittkites.com, Ron Kitt sells one model, the Monsta III, for $989, but he also sells some sport models for less than $50.

Last weekend, a man flying a delta shaped model seemed serenely lost in the flight of his kite. “He paid less than $50 for that kite, and he’s happy,” said Weider. “You don’t need to spend any more than that.”

Weider remembers his first kites. A painter and photographer, he bartered his art for them.

North Kingstown residents may remember him practicing at Quonset Point in what was an open field near Compass Rose Beach in the 1990s. At first, he says, he didn’t feel accomplished enough to join the frequent flyers at Brenton Point. He began competing in 1994 when he placed second in a novice class at Brenton Point. Today, he holds several indoor and outdoor championship titles in precision flying, ballet and tricks. He says, “If I can do this, anyone can.”

At the kite festival, admittance, parking, and flying lessons will be free.

tmeade@projo.com