Fantasia’s 30th anniversary poster channels witchcraft and legacy as the festival prepares for another global genre takeover.

Fantasia isn’t just celebrating 30 years—it’s leaning fully into what made it matter in the first place.

Ahead of its first wave of programming announcements in May, the Fantasia International Film Festival has revealed its official poster for the 2026 edition, and it feels exactly like the tone-setter you’d expect from a festival that’s built its reputation on discovery, risk, and global genre storytelling.

The artwork, once again created by Montréal artist Donald Caron—his 17th poster for the festival—doesn’t play it safe. It pulls from Macbeth’s Weird Sisters, Greek mythology’s Three Fates, and even Gustav Klimt’s The Three Ages of Women, blending those influences into a single image of three generations of sorceresses gathered around a cauldron. Out of that mist, Fantasia’s signature Cheval Noir emerges, tying the visual directly back to the festival’s identity.

It’s stylized, it’s witchy, and it’s very intentional.

And honestly, it lines up with what Fantasia has always been. This is the festival where genre doesn’t get filtered—it gets amplified. The one that’s been quietly setting the tone for what the rest of the year looks like long before wider audiences catch up.

Founded in 1996, Fantasia has built a reputation as one of the most important genre festivals in the world, not just because of what it screens, but because of what it introduces. This is where Perfect Blue made its mark early on. Where Ringu helped spark Western J-horror. Where filmmakers like Adam Wingard and entire waves like Screenlife horror found early footing. More recently, it’s been the launchpad for acquisitions like Skinamarink and Shelby Oaks, and bidding wars that signal what’s about to break out next.

That’s the real context behind this poster.

It’s not just art. It’s a signal.

Fantasia runs July 16 through August 2 in Montréal, and if history holds, this is where a lot of the year’s most interesting genre films will quietly step into the spotlight first. The imagery already points in that direction—fantasy, folklore, the strange and the surreal—all the lanes Fantasia consistently returns to and elevates.

For HMU, this is always one of the kickoff festivals of the year. Not the loudest. Not the most commercial. But the one that tends to show you what’s coming before everyone else catches on.

And if this poster is any indication, they’re not changing that approach anytime soon.