European Atelier for young festival managers

European Festivals Association,
15 March 2006, Belgium

Are you a young and motivated festival operator? And you feel the need to improve your skills on how to run a festival? The European Festivals Association, in co-operation with various partners from the field, has set up a workshop for young festival managers. The European Atelier is a management programme especially designed for young festival operators, with a special focus on those who are working in the programming department or who have ambitions to become involved in programming and programming related issues within a festival. It is set up as a workshop to experience high-level reflection and exchange in the field of festival 'programming' management. About 40 young festival managers will meet for five days to work in topical-based working groups, attend lectures and debates, learn from case studies and implement practical activities. Outstanding top professionals such as Gerard Mortier, Director of the Opéra National de Paris, former General Director of the Salzburger Festspiele and first Intendant of the RuhrTriennale, and Bernard Faivre d'Arcier, former longstanding Director of the Festival d'Avignon confirmed their participation and will stay for some days to share their rich professional experience with the young generation of festival directors, as will Nele Hertling, spokeswoman of the Berliner Konferenz and Director of the “Berlin Artist Program” of the DAAD (German Academic Exchange Service), Gavin Henderson, Principal of Trinity College of Music in London, Artistic Director of the Dartington International Summer School and former EFA President, Darko Brlek, EFA President and Artistic and Managing Director of the Ljubljana Festival, Rose Fenton, co-founder of LIFT – London International Theatre Festival, Brian McMaster, longstanding Director of the Edinburgh International Festival, Tom Stromberg, Director art program for the EXPO Hannover 2000, Prof. Dr. Matthias Theodor Vogt, Director of the Institut für kulturelle Infrastruktur Sachsen and Professor at the University of Applied Sciences Zittau/Görlitz, Steve Austen, initiator of many international cultural projects, institutions and of the Felix Meritis Foundation, teaches at the Amsterdam/Maastricht Summer University. And with many others the negotiations are still running! On top of these contributions EFA invited some young festival directors, especially from South- Central- and Eastern Europe, who have proven their innovative and trend-setting abilities in the festival circuit. All together, they are ready to discuss and dialogue for some intense days with the next generation of artistic festival directors about the future of our sector. Round tables, informal talks and contacts with the artists and with leading cultural institutions and arts houses located in the region create an outstanding opportunity for young festival operators to improve their skills in various environments. In other words: pragmatic know-how combined with a high degree of conceptual content in the management discipline is the guideline to the Atelier. The first European Atelier for young festival managers 2006 will take place in the beautiful city of Görlitz from 15 until 21 May 2006, in co-operation with Theorem, the Institut für kulturelle Instrastruktur Sachsen (IKS), Dartington International Summer School and the Felix Meritis Foundation in Amsterdam. The city of Görlitz (together with the Polish part Zgorzelec) is currently bidding for the title "European Capital of Culture", to be attributed to a German city in 2010.