Researching the spirit of place at a festival. Mental mapping on Sziget Festival

Abstract

This paper deals with the atmosphere of Sziget Festival. My research goal was to interpret and to depict the Festival as a socio-cultural environment, an experienced material and spiritual space, as a special place, that exists only for a week. Based on the results, the mental places of Sziget Festival i.e. places existing on festival goers’ mind, the most important values of the venue, the functions of the sites, the forces creating places, the most characteristic atmosphere elements of the place, and the channels of perception of the spirit of place can be described. The applied objective of the research was also to assist in festival development from the formation of festival image and marketing communication to practical considerations. Thus, the research points out the usability of both the social sciences and the applied research (marketing and market research) of genius loci and some well-suited methods.