Thoughts on a draft manifesto, created as part of the first Festivals of the Future retreat at Cove Park, Scotland…

We believe in the work and what it says

We believe in women, female leadership and female groups / a femme or female centred approach / feminist approaches

We believe in utopias

We believe in co-existence

We believe in including a diversity of voices

We believe in being authentic complex-integrity

We believe in the potential for art to transform societies

We believe in festival as ever evolving community

We believe in the ability of democracy to survive

We believe in emerging future art forms

We believe in care for intelligences, desires and sensibilities

We want to foreground complexity

We want to create space for the invention of what we don’t know yet

We want to create a space where everything can emerge

We want to create the best conditions for artists; their work holds the key to our futures

We want to create free spaces for dialogue and collaboration

We want to keep spark and excitement alive

We want to keep our utopia a utopian place

We want to make things in a solidary way
We want to advocate for the value of art

We want time and space to care for our physical and mental organisms and organisations

We want to inform and inspire others

We want to build a legacy/have ripple effects/reach beyond for a different kind of future

We want our work valued and recognised for both what we do and how we do it (a feminist approach)

We know there is strength in numbers

We know we can imagine our own futures

We know we can dedicate our knowledge, capacity and vision to shareable outcomes

We know we need to take care of what is brilliant about us

We know we hold power that we can share with others / We know we are awesome and powerful

We know we are more than us / there are other and more possible allies out there

We know we (invention can) exist in a challenging environment / we are overstretched and under-resourced

We know our way of working can generate new realities

We know we have more potential than we are able to act upon