St. Julian’s School Hosts the ISTA Festival

February 14th 2023

From the 2nd to 5th of February, St. Julian's once again opened its doors to ISTA, the International School Theatre Association, and hosted a Middle school festival. [Click to watch a video of the event!]

50 students from 5 schools, around Portugal and Europe, engaged in creative theatre work with visiting ISTA artists. A cultural excursion, social events and workshops with local artists were also included, culminating in a performance of work at the end of the festival. Having been a member school and global patron of ISTA for over 20 years, hundreds of St Julian's students have benefited from attending an ISTA event, and we are very pleased to be hosting again this year. Next year our groups will be travelling abroad to festivals in other countries and schools. Check out these links to find out more about The pedagogy of an ISTA festival and see what else they offer.

Flickr album: ISTA Festival at St. Julian's School | Height: auto | Theme: Default | Skin: Default Skin

A special thank you goes to PACT for funding the accommodation for the students from Ukraine. A message from Pechersk says it all, “Our students have had such a wonderful experience. They have been smiling and laughing since Thursday, and had so much fun making new connections; such a wonderful tonic after the year they have just had. The story that held the creative work together had such a strong message of hope for all; it is my hope they’ll be kept lifted by it for days and weeks to come. Thank you all so much. Our wonderful students go home changed, challenged, lighter and lifted.”

The following article is written by festival participants Thomas Nash, Henry Trigg and Noah Erasmus

After three years of restrictions, we finally managed to get ISTA up and running in our school again, and it was truly marvellous to see all the new faces in the crowd. The start of the new year has always been a special time to celebrate newfound maturity, connect with friends both old and new, and learn new skills, but now with ISTA, we can truly emphasise these three things.

Every festival is different; each is a unique cultural experience, all of its own, with its amazing events and wonderful people. And the impact is astoundingly far-reaching, too, affecting everything from a participant’s determination to their outlook on life.

WHAT IS AN ISTA FESTIVAL:

ISTA Festival is a space where you can have fun and make new friends through the medium of the theatre,

LEARNING THROUGH THEATRE, NOT LEARNING ABOUT IT

Here’s a list of some of the different activities that we were involved in:- Working with ISTA artists Carl and Sydney, drama games, musical presentation by Zé Barros, visit to Lisbon, workshop and guided improv of the Stone Soup story, discussing and sharing ideas, creating poems, movement and drama tasks to explore our ideas, performance and workshop with Porbatuka drumming group, social night (memorable renditions of Queen songs!), dinners at school, dinner on the beach, hanging out with new friends, final performance. The list could go on and

MEETING NEW PEOPLE:

Amongst the fifty people gathered in our school for this fantastic event were participants from St John’s in Belgium, Eyuboglu in Turkey, Pechersk School from Ukraine, PaRk in Lisbon and St Julian’s. Meeting all those people was one of the best things about the whole festival.

RECURRING THEMES:

The theme of the festival was ‘Celebrating Differences’ and the story used to set us on our journey was ‘Sopa da Pedra’ (Stone Soup). However, we found that compassion, bravery and support were some of the recurring themes in this year’s ISTA festival, which served as a helpful reminder of what we should be doing to help all those in need, including (but not limited to) those hit by the recent Earthquake in Syria and Turkey.

SKILLS DEVELOPED: