INTERNATIONAL FOLK FESTIVAL
Hot summer nights and hot air balloons, dancers and entertainers from all around the globe, flocks of joyful people and the always brilliant and unique taste of street food. Those are just some of the delights that we've experienced in the first days of the International Folk Festival in Karlovac. It's a rare treat to be able to order Korean food and see a traditional Mexican dance show all while casually strolling and enjoying the company of your friends.
Dancers and musicians from Mexico, South Korea, China, Ukraine and Island of Guam took the streets of our small, usually sleepy town by storm. Through their carefully choreographed moves, attire, face expressions and traditional food they showed us just a glimpse of their cultural heritage bestowed upon them from generation to generation.
WE ALL LOVE A GOOD STORY
"Man is by nature a social animal..." said Aristotle a long time ago, and since the beginning of time people have flocked together to form deep social bonds as it is rooted in our DNA. Individuals formed families, families formed communities, communities formed societies and we grew as a species together. The visceral part of our heritage, the glue that held communities and societies was our ability to transfer our knowledge and experiences to future generations. Through time, the gathered knowledge and experience became culture and folklore and was transferred with dance, art and expression in general. All of that transferred into storytelling.
The one thing we all love is a good story, and there are many examples of that from articles, books, movies... In this modern day and age we find ourselves keeping the traditions and culture alive through performance and combine them with stories through new and modern “means of expression” - through digital media, photographs, videos, internet and social media. Still the core off all of it is a good story, good stories were continuously told, often embellished, to intrigue us and to spark our curiosity.
What a beautiful time to be alive, not so long ago people would gather around the campfire and tell each other stories, they were limited by the knowledge of the storytellers, now we have all of societies knowledge at the tip of our fingers and every single person has the opportunity to be a storyteller. No matter where on this Earth you live, how remote your home is, you can share your stories all over this beautiful blue planet.
CREATING EXPERIENCE
The old great stories continue to be told, new stories continue to be born and the whole cycle continues as long as there are social animals on this planet. So as improbable as it seems to see people from Island of Guam, Mexico, South Korea, China and Ukraine telling their stories to people in a small town in the middle of a small country like Croatia, it just shows you how far we advanced. And still through all this time, rise and fall of great societies, one thing continues, great stories and experiences of some of the greatest heroes and storytellers.
This festival was an invaluable experience for us and we are immensely proud to be a part of this beautiful story. As an up and coming agency we pride ourselves in our motto of „creating experience“, the best way to experience something is through a well told story and what a great story this is.
