Fest of Fools ✷ Prague

Fest of Fools ✷ Prague

Get ready to giggle, question, reflect, and maybe even snort-laugh! From October 24 to 26, 2025, this three-day festival puts humor center stage as a powerful force in choreography, cultural expression, and social conversation.

Four choreographers are stepping up to show how humor can do more than make us laugh—it can also shake things up, shift perspectives, and open doors to deeper understanding. It can be a sharp tool for critique, connection, and even healing. At its core, Fest of Fools challenges the notion that difficult topics should be approached with seriousness alone. For the organizers, humor is a form of reflection and temporary distancing—a subversive tool that enables individuals and communities to engage with complex topics, uncover contradictions, question power structures, challenge societal norms, initiate social change, and support conflict resolution. Through performances and hands-on labs, the festival dives into humor as a serious (but still funny) player in today's world.

Following the successful Berlin edition at the English Theatre Berlin | IPAC, as part of the IETM plenary meeting in May, the festival is now coming to Prague, taking over ikostel and Goethe-Institut. It aims not only to strengthen the regional arts scene but also to contribute to the growing recognition of humor as a legitimate medium of cultural and choreographic practice, as well as an essential form of social dialogue. This event is also a part of the celebration of the & ., an artistic collective founded by choreographer and performer Alica Minar, one of the curators and choreographers of the festival who will perform her solo piece on October 24. On the same day you will get a chance to watch ! trying to tell a life-changing joke (by Felix Baumann). On October 25 the program will introduce a performance called by Tom Janypka and , a cleansing journey by Raul Vargas Torres.

In Dancing Goethe feat. Fest of Fools, humor becomes a tool of dance. Across five artist-led masterclasses and collective experiments, participants explore how humor and playfulness can shape choreography, expand movement language, and open new ways of reflecting, doing and reacting. Rooted in the body, this lab uncovers humor’s power as both a creative force of dance and cultural practice.

Program of performances in ikostel:

• October 24
  • 19:00   Show 1: DEVOURER
  • 20:00   Show 2: ha ha ha hi!
  • 21:00–21:30   Discussion
  • 21:30–open end   5 year celebration of Alica Minar & col.
• October 25
  • 19:00   Show 1: Lonesome Cowboy
  • 20:00   Show 2: The Trinity
  • 21:00–21:30   Discussion

Program of labs in Goethe-Institut:

• October 24   9:30–11:00   masterclass with Raul Nene Vargas Torres
• October 25   10:00–14:00   masterclass with Alica Minar & Felix Baumann
• October 26   10:00–14:00   masterclass with Tom Janypka + Closing session (all artists)

We want Fest of Fools to be open to everyone, which is why we offer three price levels of tickets. All of them grant you admission to a specific festival evening, but they also allow you to support the work of artists. In addition to one-day tickets, we also offer an exclusive two-day package so you don't miss a thing.
Tickets: https