IE University and Lara Foundation collaborate with Hay Festival Budapest 2012

Angeles Caso, Martha Thorne and Rolf Strom-Olsen have been invited to participate in the first edition of Hay Festival in Budapest on May 4^th and 5^th. Hay Festival Budapest will be held  in the heart of the city listed as a World Heritage Site. The Festival will gather together leading authors and thinkers from Central Europe and the world to celebrate this exchange of ideas. Among the other guests that will give color to the festival are, among others, Bob Geldof, Jung Chang, Ben Okri, Shigeru Ban, Tibor Fischer, Hanif Kureishi, and Georg von Habsburg.

Jose Manuel Lara Foundation, after a series of collaborations with the Hay Festivals in Granada, Segovia and Colombia, participates in this year's new edition in Budapest, as well as IE University, which after three years as an academic partner, acts as lead partner of Budapest's prestigious international festival.

Throughout the event,  IE University will host a conversation on "Architecture and Sustainability" between Martha Thorne, Associate Dean of IE School of Architecture, and Shigeru Ban, internationally famous Japanese architect known for his involvement in rehabilitation of areas hit by natural disasters and for work, which includes the Pompidou Centre in Metz, France. IE University will also participate in a conversation on the European Union - its past and current opportunities and challenges – a discussion between Historian Rolf Strom-Olsen, Professor at IE University, and HRH Georg von Habsburg, President of the Red Cross Hungary, Hungarian Ambassador Extraordinary and member of the International Advisory Board of IE. The conversation will be moderated by the President of Hay Festival, Revel Guest, executive producer of films and documentaries like the recently released War Horse by Steven Spielberg.

Meanwhile, Jose Manuel Lara Foundation and the Cervantes Institute will sponsor a meeting on the subjects of 'art and life, fiction and reality' between the writer and journalist Ángeles Caso, biographer and novelist of Empress Elizabeth, and author of titles such as 'Contra el viento’, and Ana Gavín, Director of the Foundation.

In the past twenty years, Hay Festival has brought together writers from around the world to discuss and share experiences during the festival. Hay Festival is a celebration for poets, scientists, authors, actors, politicians and opinion leaders to promote great ideas that can change our thinking about the world, or as Bill Clinton described it – it is "the Woodstock of the mind."

Hay Festival has now fifteen festivals on five continents, in which the imagination, ideas and thoughts of their international authors cross borders and genres.

About the Jose Manuel Lara Foundation

Jose Manuel Lara Foundation aims to contribute to the dissemination, promotion, development, research and protection of Andalusian culture, within the general framework of the Hispanic culture. Created in 1992, its main objectives include: promoting creative activities, convening and granting awards, creating and proposing cultural events, organizing seminars, conferences and round tables, exhibitions, and encouraging reading. 

About IE University

IE University is the extension of the educational model of IE for undergraduate education and offers an innovative proposal for graduate and postgraduate studies in Madrid and Segovia. It has 1,100 students from 75 countries and a faculty comprised of about 400 national and international experts. IE University has official degrees taught in English and Spanish in the fields of Business Administration, Architecture, Biology, Communication, Law, Finance, Psychology and International Relations. The university has a strong international focus and offers undergraduate and graduate degrees, with a greater emphasis on the latter.