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The twenty-second Mariposa Storytelling Festival will be March 13 - 15, 2009.
Call the Arts Council at (209) 966-3155 or (800) 903-9936 to reserve your tickets early!
THE 2008 STORYTELLERS
PHOTOS FROM OUR 21st
MARIPOSA STORYTELLING FESTIVAL
March 7 - 9, 2008
Featuring Patrick Ball, Milbre Burch, Lyn Ford, Andy Offutt Irwin, Barbara McBride-Smith and Tim Tingle
The Storytelling Festival has been recognized and supported by two fine organizations: The James Irvine Foundation and The National Endowment for the Arts. "A Great Nation Deserves Great Art."
Storytelling …Not What You Remember
Storytelling has existed as long as humanity has had language. It is the world of myth, of history, of the imagination... it explains life. Every culture has its stories and legends, just as every culture has its storytellers and often revered figures with the magic of the tale in their voices and minds.
Though nearly all humans tell stories, many individuals have brought this skill to the level of art. Storytelling Festivals feature the work of these individuals. Elements of the storytelling art form include visualization (the seeing of images in the mind's eye), and vocal and bodily gestures. In many ways, the art of storytelling draws upon other art forms such as acting, oral interpretation, and performance studies.
The Mariposa Storytelling Festival is an annual event that features nationally known oral Storytellers. Each Storyteller has six scheduled times to share six different stories with you. The featured Storytellers are professional performing artists who often incorporate movement, gestures, expressions, song, music or dance in their stories. In the oral tradition, storytelling includes the teller and the audience. The Storyteller creates the experience, while the audience perceives the message and creates personal mental images from the words heard and the gestures seen. In this experience, the audience becomes the co-creator of the art.
Our festival is a multiple day event. All six featured Storytellers rotate in a two and a half hour performance on Friday and Saturday nights in the auditorium at Mariposa County High School. During the day on Saturday, the Storytellers alternate between two venues at the high school providing an opportunity to share more stories in an intimate audience setting. During the Saturday lunch break, we host an open mike event referred to as "story swapping," where our audience may sign up to share their own stories.
The festival culminates in a grand finale storytelling performance on Sunday afternoon at the Visitors Center Auditorium, in Yosemite National Park, where all six of our professional Storytellers will share their final stories of our three day event.
The intrinsic nature of stories was described by Reynolds Price, when he wrote:
"A need to tell and hear stories is essential to the species Homo sapiens--second in necessity apparently after nourishment and before love and shelter. Millions survive without love or home, almost none in silence; the opposite of silence leads quickly to narrative, and the sound of story is the dominant sound of our lives."
Come fill your need of stories from a wealth of cultures, traditions and styles at our three day extravaganza of compelling performances by six of our nations best Storytellers. Don’t miss a single word!