Festivals - Fondazione Fitzcarraldo

The most useful networks seem to be the informal ones among professionals, artists,
operators and organizers worldwide, followed by relations with similar festivals and
the personal net of contacts. The risk of crisis seems fairly irrelevant: few have experienced
some, due to incidental unexpected events (the Swedish foreign minister fatally
stabbed just before the festival; sudden unexpected death of the initiator of the festival
idea), or other external causes such as the weather problems (cold, rain) or some contextual
problems (locations) or simply because of unfavourable criticism from press.
Only one festival stresses the importance ‘to foresee every problem and be able to find
quick compromises’.
Projections in the future show a general expectation to improve in several aspects:
increasing artistic and cultural quality, reinforcing and diversifyng the sources of income
such as the European Commission, sponsorship and merchandising, sponsorships,
prolonging the duration of the festival and enlarging its activities, enhancing
the programs every year so as to keep interest alive, obtaining an international recognition,
improving young professionals skills and opportunities, increasing cooperation
with local and international institutions, improving the relationship with the
environment.
From the comparison and analyses of the eleven festivals questionnaires, the main
critical weakness emerging can be resumed as follows:
a tendency to follow standard tools and practices, with a not so prominent creative
effort to find more adequate instruments and topics as regards position,
management and development of the festival;
a lack of professional competences, especially in project management
and fundraising;
a not so functional organization and deployment of specific roles and human
resources (e.g. the need to cover some neglected aspects such as documentation,
volunteers involvement, etc.)
unexploited potentialities of relationships, partnerships and support;
the lack of effort and instruments in monitoring audience;
the lack of attention and instruments in evaluating the festival experience and
in communication with the policy makers and public opinion, in order to
demonstrate the role, the potential and the impact on the local community .
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