our craft
We are storytellers - we tell oral tradition stories.
We seek and notice traditional tales from people all over the world.
We create fertile contexts so the stories can be heard and other stories can be told; we thus learn with and about the ancestral language of traditional tales, an endless and poetic field of knowledge.
noticing stories – its many senses*
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Since the beginning of the world, storytellers and time have walked hand in hand.
As tellers, seekers and listeners of tales, we may spend years, our whole life, learning from a single story – and, at the same time, we are aware there is still a lot to be learnt from it.
Tales from the oral tradition – our chosen path – are fruits of time, of the human experience on Earth. They have been told for years and years, from generation to generation. They are an endless source of life and meaning, revealed with time.
That is why we talk about noticing stories – and every story is also a noticing story.
In order to notice, one must stop. Stop to feel. Stop to look. Stop to listen. One must linger over the details. Contemplate. Learn about slow-pace and silence. Cultivate the encounter.
So that, when we notice the tale, the tale notices us.
* The name of our platform is A arte de reparar histórias, which can be freely translated as The art of noticing stories. In fact, the Portuguese verb reparar – which we translated as notice – has many meanings: it comes from the Latin re + parare and denotes (1) to notice; (2) to repair, and, in a creative reading, (3) to stop again.
a brief story of our work
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We started to notice stories - and stories started to notice us - in 2001, when we first met in a storytelling group that used to gather at the Laboratory of Social Imaginary and Education, at UFRJ (Federal University of Rio de Janeiro).
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Since then, we have been learning tales from our country´s indigineous people, entering the woods of fairytale, sailing the seas of wondrous narratives, sometimes with other storytellers, sometimes as a duo.
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In 2016, under a century-old tree, holding a piece of thread and a needle to repair a loose button and talking about the power of stories, our collaborative work sprang to life.
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Since then, we have developed processes, experiences and research with traditional narratives, always attentive to stitch together the ancient wisdom of the stories to the matters of our time, to poetry and to the sensibility of everyone who is willing to engage in noticing stories.
past venues: where we have noticed
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Oral tradition tales are maps that point to paths and lead us to places and encounters. Stories have guided us to Baalaka - arte e consciência, Espaço Iralem, Espaço Rizoma, Simples Lugar, Escritório Cosmos, Sud o pássaro verde, Intersecção, A Casa Tombada, Livraria Blooks, Espaço Ligia Diniz and many other places.
who we are
Ana Gibson is a translator, writer, art therapist, storyteller and researcher of oral tradition tales.
Juliana Franklin is a narrator and researcher of oral tradition tales, educator and art therapist.
Since 2001, Ana and Juliana have told and researched oral tradition tales and facilitated experiences with them. Together, they coordinate courses, workshops, publications, roundtables, study groups and other activities with stories and myths. In 2019, they published the book “uma história e uma história e uma história – contos dos contos de tradição oral”, which can be translated as “a story and a story and a story – telling tales from oral tradition” (Folio Digital).