May 23-26, 2025
Pronounced: Ee-kee-guy
Derived from the Japanese words "Iki" (life) and "Gai" (worth living), Ikigai invites us to embrace an intuitive journey, one that encourages us to navigate life’s complexities and, eventually, challenging us to find and embrace our true purpose, considering both intimate and social dimensions of life. It's about showing up authentically, trusting the process, and allowing your purpose to come into view, often when you least expect it.
In offering this definition, we’re very careful not to assign it to a function of work, career, or profession. Rather, from Folklife’s perspective, purpose relates to a relationship between yourself, others, and the life that surrounds us all. Finding a reason to live transcends the demands that life often demands of us, and instead, compels us to seek out the moments that get overlooked by those demands–watching a sunset, listening to music, or meeting a friend for coffee.
As we address the cyclical connections of these 5 Cultural Foci, Ikigai also helps foster that relationship to a seasonal lifestyle. Recognizing the changes that occur in our lives (Metamorphosis) and the ways that we maintain a rootedness in our purpose– not against that change, but in tandem with it. Acknowledging the journey, not the destination. Finding resonance with presence versus the inclination or expectation to think steps ahead or wallow in steps before.
And so Ikigai also insists on a sentiment of balance and harmony (Lagom), so that our purpose and presence isn’t too selfish and also not too selfless. Ikigai’s connection to Ubuntu is fundamentally about the art of gathering people together to see and be seen in our common humanness. Our purpose isn’t just that we belong to each other, but that we can be responsible in nurturing another's purpose, as well. It is here that we can spark each other’s passions, creativity, and joie de vivre (Meraki), so that we can enjoy and see the beauty in the sunset, or the melody, or the friend.
We reflect that in the organization through a series of intentions. How are we bringing more communities into our Folklife tent? How are we serving our local, regional and global community, in ways that reflect our vision and mission? Purpose is nuanced, and not always measured in bold statements. It’s often measured in the small gestures and specific intentions of our programming. Our partnership with Metier gives artists a 3-month residency to grow and expand their artistry. Our partnership with Union Arts Center gives audiences an opportunity to see how themes and ideas can be depicted in a multi-disciplinary context. Our festival includes programs that deepen folk arts relationship and connection to food and environmental justice. Folklife has the power to drive a civic narrative of Seattle and the Pacific Northwest that says You Are Welcome Here. Folklife is Everywhere. Folklife is Everyone. That is our purpose. That is our Ikigai.
What is your Ikigai?
Poster Artists
Toka Valu
Toka Valu is an indigenous Pacific Islander Artist and Illustrator with more than five years of Public Arts experience, and over twenty years of illustration & visual arts work. His artistic influences are culturally rooted and informed by his cultural upbringing in Tonga and cultivated by the Duwamish lands that he now calls home in the Pacific NW.
Toka’s practice integrates both his Tongan cultural upbringing and his transformative experience in the Pacific Northwest to establish a unique and bold artistry. As a multifaceted creative, his work aims to illuminate the unseen connections in our relationships and the resulting dynamics of these ties. Using a variety of applications, Toka’s work is contemporary in its interpretation and grounded in traditional Pasifika and Tongan aesthetic.
King Khazm
King Khazm is an emcee, visual artist, producer and community organizer who has become a prominent figure in the Hip-Hop community within Seattle and around the world. His work to engage and empower communities is demonstrated through over 25 years of music, art and community service.
Khazm serves as a board member of paralysis support organization The Here & Now Project, board member of King County arts funding agency 4Culture, manager of the historic venue Washington Hall and executive director of Hip Hop community organization 206 Zulu.