I AM A GUEST ARTIST

PROCESS FOR BECOMING A GUEST ARTIST

Thank you for your interest in being a guest artist at the 2026 Virginia Thespian Festival at the Capital One Hall & Hilton McLean-Tysons Corner January 9 - 11, 2026! We are excited to have you join us in bringing the knowledge, experience and creativity of the theatre industry to our Virginia Thespian Students and Educators!

Workshop Presenters: If you are an independent guest artist applying to teach workshops, or a representative teaching on behalf of Recruiter Level colleges, conservatories, vendors or sponsors please submit a separate workshop proposal application for each class you are interested in presenting.

Adjudicators: We are also accepting applications for adjudicators with expertise in certain topics to judge individual student events, scholarships and one-acts. Applicants for this position can not be involved in the vendor fair or college audition events due to time/schedule conflicts.

Interns: We also have a new college intern program with four specialized tracks where we pair interns with staff or guest artists for mentoring in an area of their interest. See our intern page for more information if you are a current college student!

Please complete the appropriate application no later than November 14, 2025. Scroll down for more information on our pay scale below.

**Note that we begin building our schedule matrix prior to the November 14 deadline so earlier applications may have a stronger chance of consideration.

Our staff will notify all applicants of workshop or adjudicator acceptance no later than the week of November 17th, at which point each accepted artist will be asked to return an individual adult registration form and background check to complete registration and contracts will be sent out. If you are selected and live more than a 2 hour drive away, we can cover hotel, otherwise, we have a limited budget and prioritize local artists who we ask to commute each day during the festival. Meals are covered during work hours on site.

**** Those representing colleges, conservatories, vendors or sponsors who wish to participate in our table fair or college audition events must also submit a separate application linked on the designated webpage under "partners" in the menu above. Representatives of Recruiter-Level Organizations teach in exchange for the waiving of their table registration fees.

APPLY TODAY TO BE A GUEST ARTIST FOR VTF 2026!

2026 Workshop Proposal Application

2026 Adjudicator Application

BACKGROUND CHECKS

****PLEASE NOTE: For safety and security, we require that each workshop presenter fill out the application. We must run background checks on all adults attending Festival.

VA Thespian Guest Artist Pay Scale

WHAT DOES A SESSION ENTAIL?

A Session is a 75 min - 90 min block of time where you may do one or more of the following:

Adjudication of Individual Events
Adjudication of Scholarship Candidates
Teaching a Workshop
Giving a Talkback
Delivering a Keynote introduction speech/ MC'ing a ceremony
Leading/Hosting a Special Event or Challenge

Artist Type is based on distance primarily along with other factors from the conference site.

Want to know where you fall? See the radius maps below:

The general border cities are included for local and regional. If you fall outside of either of those boundaries, you are likely a national artist. We take very few national artists currently as we want to prioritize local artists, but are open to negotiation if you can make the journey cost effective for us and the schools.