This week SMK is hosting the annual FEST Storytelling Conference 2022

The annual Federation for European Storytelling (FEST) Conference is the biggest meeting of its kind, a unique and diverse gathering of storytelling professionals from all over Europe and beyond. Attended by representatives of national and regional storytelling groups, storytelling trainers, festival organizers, promoters, education specialists, academia, storytelling professionals, and funding experts, this is the European storytelling networking opportunity of the year.

This year, for the first time in Lithuania, the 1 – 4 June FEST Storytelling Conference will take place in Vilnius, SMK University of Applied Social Sciences (Kalvarijų g. 137E). SMK is proud to be a part of this conference, where some of our lectures such as Dr. Giedrė Vaičekauskienė and Raimondas Paškevičius will also share their expertise in the field of storytelling with FEST community members. 

The FEST conference offers a unique insight into the world of oral storytelling and presents the newest research and developments in the field of applied storytelling, performance storytelling, and business in the cultural and creative industry. FEST focuses on the professional development of the oral storyteller as a performing artist and as a professional provider of oral storytelling in other (cultural) sectors, this conference brings all these aspects together and links storytelling to other industries. 

The conference is open to FEST members only. You may find the information on how to become FEST member here. This year's conference is organized by the FEST executive committee and board in cooperation with the host organization SMK. The conference partner is Go Vilnius.  

Every year this conference gathers around 100 participants from the international storytelling community in order to promote the power of storytelling within the wider society. The plenary part of the conference aims to discuss important topics for the future development of the network in relation to visibility and recognition of storytelling as a performing art, new developments in applied storytelling, and the link to other sectors and professional development.

Next to that, the conference offers 20+ workshops and lectures on several topics such as oral storytelling in tourism, working with migrants, multilingual storytelling, personal development through storytelling, traditional storytelling in modern society, storytelling and heritage, and best practice examples and inspiration sessions. Participants are also offered an open space to share and meet up during the conference, called speaker corner (see the programme for more details below). 

See Workshops & Lecture Programme
Download the full programme

Conference partner: Go Vilnius

Cover photo: ©Go Vilnius. Palace of Grand Dukes