FAI 2025 Conference Theme Reveal

Lily

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August 1, 2024

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FAI 2024

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Each year, our conference has a central theme, directing the variety of panels and programs you'll experience, reframing the conversations around our industry, and inspiring our community. FAI 2025’s theme is Illuminate.

For centuries, the mesmerizing spectacle of the Aurora Borealis, the Northern Lights, has ignited awe across the globe. Witnessing this celestial phenomenon serves as a powerful reset, reminding us of our place in the vastness of the universe. The Northern Lights serve as a powerful symbol of the interconnectedness between humans, the natural world, and the spiritual realm within Indigenous cultures across Northern Canada.

Drawing inspiration from this tradition, we invite our folk community to approach their work with a renewed sense of wonder and awe. By reigniting these fundamental emotions, we can find the passion and purpose to fuel artistic expression and positive social change.

Together, let's rekindle the flame of folk music and illuminate a path toward a brighter future.

Join us at FAI 2025 from February 19 - 23, 2025 in Montréal, Quebec, Canada!

Behind the Art

The conceptualization of this year’s art for the conference theme “Illuminate” took many different paths. In immediately knowing that we wanted the aurora borealis to be a focal part of the art, it gave opportunities to explore various art styles to find what fit best. In the end, I was most drawn to doing a wood-block carving inspired style for this year’s theme. To me, it felt like it fit perfectly to utilize a traditional folk art/craft as a foundation for this design. I was very intentional about using this wood-block style and how each carefully thought out piece came together to tell a story.

With our 2025 conference being Folk Alliance’s return to Canada, I took time to do research about native flora and fauna that would feel representative across the entire country. Some of these elements include: maple leaves, bunchberry flowers, cedar needles, okanagan sunflowers, bears, Canadian geese, beavers, foxes, and more. This, along with various folk instruments, came together to build the border of the artwork. I wanted these elements to feel special in their own way, but not take away from the central illustration. This line of thinking is how the colors for the piece were chosen. I kept most of the artwork as a monochromatic blue color scheme, allowing for the aurora borealis and north star to stand out even more by being the only different, very vivid colors of yellow, purple, green, and pink.

With the culmination of all these artistic decisions, I hope this year’s artwork can be inspirational to those attending our conference and truly “Illuminate” the passion of folk music that exist within all of us.