The Biggest Story Telling Festival In ASIA.
Live events
The art of storytelling
Music Performances
The Festival Organisers
The Gahilote Sisters - Shaguna, Prarthana, Rachna
Over time with printed books, radio and television, the oral art of storytelling started disappearing. We started working with UNESCO in 2010, to see how to preserve the art. The first thing was obviously to document it, but what after that. The festival is therefore a platform to promote the folk artists. The message is to recall our traditions and the stories around them.
- Shaguna Gahilote,
Festival Curator
FEEL THE VIBE
Whilst the storytelling scene has seen a revival in the west, in India were it was part of the community is on the verge of extinction. While some Indian storytellers are the last in the tradition practicing the art form, the others are constantly seeing dwindling students.
The festival therefore works with the dual aim of creating a performance space and creating new audience which would hopefully reap into future practitioners as well.
The festival is organised every year in Delhi since 2011 earlier at India Habitat Centre and since 2013 at the Indira Gandhi National Centre for the Arts (IGNCA) as a three day long weekend festival.
The festival hosts evening sessions for open audience ranging from children to the elderly. Morning sessions are hosted for school students from both private and state schools. Panel discussions and workshops are also organised for aspiring and professsional storytellers.
A section of the festival is also hosted in various schools across Delhi and Uttarakhand.
OUR MISSION
We are a community driven festival celebrating the art of story telling
we strive to preserve and promote the ancient art of storytelling. It stems from the idea that before there were books there were stories. The festival annually provides a common platform for storytellers from India and abroad to come together and share stories from around the world.
WHAT DO THE STORYTELLERS HAVE TO SAY
The art has been incredible, just the diversity of style in terms of how you tell stories, be it through music, be it through performance be it through body. It doesn’t get better than that. One of the best festivals in the world, NO DOUBT
- Niall Moorjani
Kathakar festival and I LOVE IT ! The warm reception, the audience is lively, ready to listen. It has been a pleasure sharing stories but also a part of my tradition, my culture as well.
- Alim Kamara
I have not seen this kind of maturity anywhere else in Delhi. The synergy between the audience and storytellers brings in such a good feeling.
- Rajeev Sethi
The vision of this festival is extraordinary. The energy is wonderful.
- Sarah Rundle
I love that it is run by three sisters in honor of their father’s legacy, in honor of sharing stories and how their father brought stories to people through Braille. They are bringing stories to people through books, but not only their own stories. They are bringing so many other storytellers from around the world.
- Lillian Rodrigues Pang
The society forgot how we grew up with stories. Kathakar revived the tradition of storytelling.
- Shri Kiren Rijiju
Storytelling is not just about sitting and telling stories. It is an experience and emotion of its own. And Kathakar bring it alive like no other festival.
- Michal Malinowski
Story Telling Festival also caught the attention of media outlets !!
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