Hilde Festerling

Discipline: Storytelling
Homebase: Chilliwack, BC
Regions Available: Lower Mainland, Fraser Valley &, Howe Sound, North
Languages: English

Hilde Festerling is a writer and storyteller who collaborates with children to ignite personal and cultural transformation through the power of stories. Hilde uses music, noisemakers, imagery, and theatre to bring her stories to life. She then invites children to connect to their own storytelling voice. Hilde: “When we tell a story, we connect the resonance of our voices and the ears of our listeners to the imaginal realm. We have the potential to be transformed by this connection. Stories teach us how to live, and how to survive. I love to share my stories with children, but more important is inviting them into the storytelling space. ” Humour is a crucial aspect of Hilde’s work; through laughter, she connects her audience to deeper emotions, to struggle and resilience. Her stories are imaginative, wild, and funny, but they are grounded in the emotional needs of children in this moment. As an older, fat queer woman performing with the entirety of her body, Hilde gives her young audience the message: every body is a good body for performing and creating. Her stories implicitly challenge hierarchical dominator culture and hetero-normativity. Hilde has been writing and performing children’s stories for nearly a decade, but her greatest flex is that she honors the artistic vision of children. She and her niece and daughter are currently developing a narrative podcast called The Goat American Novel, to be released in the fall of 2023. [email protected]

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Workshop(s)

Storytelling With Workshops - Connection Through Stories

School Year: 23-24
Discipline: Theatre, Storytelling, Interdisciplinary
Offered Languages: English
Grade Suitability: K - 5
Duration: 30 minute performance plus 90 minute workshops
Capacity: 100
Tech Requirements: none
Available Formats: In Person

This day-long offering includes one thirty minute storytelling performance plus up to three classroom workshops. Performance: Hilde has a menu of lively and hilarious original stories with deep themes and content of great interest to elementary-aged students. Schools can work with Hilde to choose which of her stories will best connect to their students’ needs. These stories are roughly 30 minutes long, suitable for elementary students, and best performed for an intimate-sized audience ( maximum 100 students). See website for story menu. Workshop Description: In this workshop, students will explore the power of storytelling as a tool for connection to the imaginal realm, connection within community, and connection to one’s own unique storytelling voice. Participants will work within a series of large-group, small-group and individual exercises designed to bring them into connection with their own storytelling voice. Students will have opportunities to perform, and the class will be coached in active listening techniques to enter more deeply into the experience of connection through storytelling. Hilde will use a variety of disciplines, including voice-work, music, noise-making, and visual imagery, to offer students the opportunities to find the storytelling medium where they can create most authentically.

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Testimonials & Reviews

When Hilde performs for and makes art with children, it is a transformative experience. She talks very seriously with children about art-making, and imparts to them a sense of the value of their own vision and skills as creators. The mobile sound effects set piece she has developed is in itself a mind-expanding tool of musical and sound education. Jane Bicycle, primary and music teacher

For the last two years of the Subdued Stringband Jamboree 2019 and 2021, Hilde has been the resident storyteller in Kidsville. Her bugle call has the children running to hear her fantastic tales. Hilde clearly loves sharing her art with the children. She is intentional and professional in the way that she interacts with them. I highly recommend Hilde for inventive, unconventional, engaging and memorable entertainment. Maryanne Mills, Director of Kidsville, Subdued Stringband Jamboree

"My Students  were enthralled and begged to have her back as soon as possible!" Hannah Beuhrer, grade 3 teacher

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