From walks in the woods to moments of joyful surprise, we caught up with Liz, Deputy CEO of Wild Rumpus CIC, to talk about how Just So Festival comes together
Just So Festival feels meticulously curated yet wonderfully loose and playful. How do you begin the programming process each year, and what principles guide your decisions?
The programming process begins each year with a walk through the woods, thinking about and reflecting on what we thought was brilliant the year before, and the things we’d like to continue to move forward with. From there, we start to think about what the themes might be and what the creative vision is.
Out of that creative vision, and the world-building sessions we have, sometimes internally with staff and sometimes with artists, we put together curatorial guidelines.
The principles that guide our decisions are really about the curators, about community, and about variety. We want as many voices as possible to be represented within the programme, and we’re always thinking about our communities and about creating a wide variety of experiences.
When you’re commissioning or inviting artists, what qualities or approaches signal that their work will sit well within the Just So ecosystem?
For me, one of the key elements of Just So is the intergenerational approach that we have. A lot of our programming is about being able to sit with your grandma and both of you finding something enjoyable, funny, exciting, touching or emotional in the same piece of work.
So if we think a piece of work is going to be intergenerational, that really speaks to us. We want to make work that the whole family can enjoy. While lots of our programme is centred around children and young people, it’s really important to us that parents, carers, grandmas and granddads are all brought along on the journey too, and that they have a fulfilling experience as well.