StoryTANK, European Think Tank created by Le Groupe Ouest & lim² | less is more Powered by Creative Europe — MEDIA
We bring together experienced screenwriters and fiction writers, giving them the opportunity to explore new perspectives and practical approaches alongside researchers from related fields, including cognitive and social sciences, physiology, mathematics and neuroscience…
The aim is to think together, from a non-dogmatic, European and humanist perspective, about the function of storytelling — both physiological and social — through images and sound, while taking into account the new ways of thinking and creating shaped by the digital revolution.
The StoryTANK opens up new perspectives on one of the most complex and fascinating creative professions: that of the screenwriter, storyteller, fiction writer and creator of singular worlds.
The creation of narratives raises fundamental questions that go far beyond the artistic. It also touches on anthropology, society, politics and our ability to imagine the future. Stories bring communities together through shared visions, emotions and imagined worlds.
Today, films, series and, more broadly, all forms of storytelling through moving images have become the lifeblood of how our societies represent themselves and imagine their future.
For better or worse, the past twenty years have seen the degradation and global spread of a particular kind of Hollywood storytelling, especially popular with younger generations: blockbuster films built around weapons, brutality, violence and superheroes. This now raises a global concern. It is as though our ability to dream, imagine new horizons and offer alternative models to younger generations were slowly breaking down.
Europe’s strength lies in qualities that are too often taken for granted: its rich cultural diversity, secular traditions, distinctive histories and experiences, and the personal stories through which social issues can be explored. Since the Enlightenment, European storytelling has embraced a remarkable range of themes and perspectives, with a unique capacity to question and reflect on the world around us.
Regaining a strong command of storytelling, while remaining open to new methods and approaches, therefore appears to be a fundamental way of creating meaning — and a form of humanist “soft power” in a disoriented world. The challenge of creating stories that move beyond violence, and of offering contemporary narratives that imagine a diversity of alternatives and collective visions, has become more important than ever.
This is why lim² launched the StoryTANK
From a humanist perspective, the key aim of the StoryTANK is to build a European network of writers and researchers to deepen our understanding of how stories work, how fiction is constructed, and how meaning emerges — beyond the standardised and symbolic archetypes produced by Hollywood. We bring experienced screenwriters and fiction writers together to work proactively and practically with researchers from fields that intersect with storytelling, including cognitive sciences, social sciences and physiology.
The StoryTANK takes a long-term perspective. The knowledge and insights generated through its work are intended not only for future generations of filmmakers and storytellers, but also for future audiences and the stories they will experience through moving images.
The StoryTANK structure hinges on two axes.
Research workshops bring together experienced screenwriters and researchers from related fields, selected for their potential contribution to understanding how stories are created and/or perceived. The aim is to open up new perspectives and deepen our understanding of storytelling.
Following each workshop, participating screenwriters and researchers take part in public conversations or filmed masterclasses, shared through the StoryTANK’s social media channels.
The first four seasons were fuelled by discussions and deciphering the creative processes behind storytelling, the role of stories in shaping our imagination, and their ability to help us construct and make sense of the world.
For its 5th season, the StoryTANK team embarked on a new experiment lead by six captivated and captivating researchers. The aim was to observe and film the emergence of story ideas in experimental set ups created by THE FACTORY OF WORLDS, a unique facility in Europe that has been under development at Le Groupe Ouest since 2023, with the support of the French Ministry of Culture. Six screenwriters and filmmakers from six European countries took part in the experiment.
The StoryTANK offers a way to explore and shed new light on the practices of fiction writers at a time when storytelling is being transformed by the digital revolution — from artificial intelligence to algorithms — and when our social, political and ecological reference points are increasingly unsettled.
The StoryTANK focuses here on three experimental prototypes: (1) the Cave, (2) the Black Room, and (3) the Plateau. This experiment is a first.