On 26 September, Studio 88 welcomed artists, storytellers, educators and visitors for Gathering of Stories, the main public event of Storyscapes Festival 2026.
This year’s theme was Stories as Community. What happens when people come together through stories?
Stories carry history, memory, and knowledge. They tell us something about where we come from, while introducing us to lives and experiences beyond our own. For Storyscapes, we wanted to bring some of these different stories into the same space.
Our first Storyscapes in 2025 was centred more directly on storytelling as a creative practice, through the theme Tales of Change and Connection. This year, our attention turned to what stories do between people: how they are shared, how they travel and how they bring people together.
There was something particularly meaningful about seeing familiar faces return. We were grateful that Joanne Lauterjung and Matt Yoxall, our previous artists in residence who presented at our first Storyscapes, came back this year simply to take part as fellow participants.
A gathering develops its own history. People return. New people arrive. Conversations begun on one occasion continue somewhere else.
This year, we also welcomed new storytellers, including Emily, Hilcia, Jay, Jameel, Rath and many others. Their perspectives joined a wider mix of local folklore and history, childhood, migration, family and artistic practice.
We tried to make the day feel less like a conference.
Studio 88 became Story Village: a place where people could listen, wander, talk and encounter different ideas. Some of the most interesting moments were not part of the formal programme. They happened over lunch, between sessions, or when someone continued a conversation with a person they had only just met.
We are learning that a gathering needs space. To fill a programme with speakers and activities is not too difficult. People also need time to talk, reflect and simply stay awhile.
Storyscapes continued beyond that September gathering.
On 24 October, Thunder / Scales brought our exploration of Phaya Luang and other mythical creatures of local folklore into another form. The exhibition and accompanying conversations opened the story to different artistic interpretations.
We have sculptures, digital drawings, photography, and writing that explore the mythical figure of Phaya Luang through reinterpretation, storytelling, and imagination. Artists who joined us include Aittiphat Rakwongwarit, Siwawong Rakwongwarit, Wanlop Hansunthai, and Vararat Khongjit. The exhibition is till 14 December 2026, so come catch it if you haven’t.
Makara, Luang, Dragon: The Illusion of Sacred Creatures, a talk by Dr Pensupa Sukkata, was very well attended by academics, historians, guides, scholars, and passionate folklore lovers. Last but not least, Sornsak Wongjarin, musician and folklorist, who already impressed the audience during the Gathering of Stories, once again wowed the audience with his stories and voice.
This is part of what interests me about stories. They belong somewhere, but they do not remain still. They are carried by people, retold in different circumstances and changed by those who encounter them.
In that sense, we are all part of a chain of stories.
Studio 88 has its own. Its story began in Yunnan, China, with the Tai Lue people, travelled to Chiang Mai, then to the Netherlands and around the world, before returning to Chiang Mai. Along the way, people met, ideas travelled and new relationships formed.
Perhaps that is why, of all Studio 88’s themed residencies, Storyscapes is the one most closely connected to the vision of Studio 88 itself.
Studio 88 has always been about bringing together global voices and local roots. Artists arrive with their own histories and ways of seeing. They encounter other artists, a different culture, and the community around them. Something is exchanged, even if it cannot always be easily measured.
Storyscapes makes this visible.
Stories give us a way to share those encounters. They allow local histories and international perspectives to sit alongside one another. They give people somewhere to begin a conversation.
Our children’s programme, Guardians of Phaya Luang, will move to the next holiday season. This gives us more time to bring the story of Phaya Luang to children and families in a form where they can participate and make their own contributions.
For me, Storyscapes remains an experiment in what Studio 88 can be beyond a place where artists come to work.
It can also be a place where people return, new people are welcomed, and stories continue from one encounter to another. That is perhaps the simplest meaning of Stories as Community: stories do not only describe a community. Shared, heard, and carried forward, they can help create one.
Reviving Nature 2027, our themed Residency now in its 3rd edition, is still open for applications.
