Landing is a gathering exploring how dance and movement can help us foster deep, right relationships with land and each other. The festival will take place August 9-11, 2024 at Zumwalt Acres, a regenerative agriculture farm and community in Sheldon, Illinois. The weekend will consist of workshops (movement, writing, and dialogue), prepared and spontaneous performances, farm meals, and community-building.

Our guiding questions include:

• What does it mean to be in reciprocal and loving relationship with land?

• How might settlers be in interdependence with land while participating in Indigenous justice and sovereignty?

• What does it mean to relate with land that you are ancestrally connected to, and land that you aren’t, with care and complexity?

• What does “homeland” mean to you?

We believe that every person with a body is a dancer, and that to move with intention is to dance. Come dance with us!

Register here!

BACKGROUND

Many of us have felt disconnected from land, food systems, our own bodies, and our ancestors (as a result of white supremacy, settler colonialism, late-stage capitalism, and so on). These alienations not only harm us individually, but also help us participate in ongoing systems of ecological catastrophe and destruction, Indigenous dispossession, and other violences. How can we build reciprocal and loving relationship with land, in our fully feeling bodies? Through our virtual gatherings and our physical gathering on the farm, we aim to build a community of practice around feeling fully and relating with the land around and in us. As we pay deep attention to, develop and move through our embodied knowledge, we’ll draw on a wide variety of traditions, lineages, forms, and practices, including dance forms like American modern dance and Chinese classical dance, spiritual traditions like Judaism, Christianity, and Buddhism, our families’ histories, academic forms like Indigenous studies, Black feminist theory, and queer theory, and anything that you are connected to and bring with you.

ACTIVITIES

Our time together will include:

• Opening circle

• Farm meals

• Workshops (e.g. deep forest walk with an Indigenous scholar, dance workshops across forms, exercises and experiments in moving with the land, writing and dialogue about concepts of home and land)

• Stage performance

• Nighttime dance party

• Closing circle

ARRIVAL AND DEPARTURE

Please arrive at Zumwalt Acres by 6pm on Friday, August 9. Our opening circle will begin shortly afterwards, followed by dinner. 

Our closing circle will be at 12pm on Sunday, August 11, followed by lunch. Please plan to depart by 3pm. 

TRAVEL

Getting to Zumwalt Acres requires driving. After you register, you will receive a link to a carpool coordination spreadsheet. If you are driving and have available spots in your car, please consider jotting down your information to offer a ride to those who may need. If you are seeking a ride, please keep an eye on the spreadsheet and contact those who are offering rides! We will also support coordination as needed.

Some travel routes:

• Chicago - drive (about 2 hours)

• Chicago - train

• There is an Amtrak train from Chicago Union Station to Gilman, IL. Then, it’s about a 30min drive to the farm. Indicate in the carpool coordinator if you choose this route so we can coordinate pickups from Gilman to the farm.

• Chicago - shuttle

• There is a shuttle from Midway Airport to Bourbonnais Metro Centre (for $2). Then, it’s about a 1hr drive to the farm. Indicate in the carpool coordinator if you choose this route so we can coordinate pickups from Burbonnais to the farm.

• Indianapolis - drive (about 2 hours)

• Champaign - drive (about 1 hour 30min)

FOOD

All meals will be provided, in addition to snacks throughout. All food will be vegetarian with vegan options. Dishes will be labeled with ingredients/allergens. Food will be prepared in a kitchen that may be cross-contaminated with nuts, gluten, and other allergens. If you have any dietary restrictions or concerns please let us know through the RSVP form, and we will accommodate. Please make it clear in the RSVP form if cross-contamination is a concern, and we will work out a solution. Please bring any additional food/beverages that will help you feel comfortable and nourished.

COVID-19

Please take a COVID rapid test within the 24 hours before arriving at ZA and have a picture of your negative test ready upon arrival. This helps protect each other and our community, particularly those who are immunocompromised or have other invisible disabilities. If a COVID test is not accessible to you, please reach out and we will have one ready for you upon arrival.

HOUSING

Most attendees will be expected to camp on the farm land. Composting toilets and running water will be available outdoors for use. There is one shower inside the farm greenhouse that guests may use if needed.

If you will not be using air travel and plan to drive to the farm, we ask that you bring your own gear or borrow from a friend if you can. If you are flying or cannot bring your own gear, we have a limited amount of tents, sleeping pads, and sleeping bags available to lend at no cost. Please let us know in the form if you will need to borrow gear.

If you are unable to camp for any reason, we have limited indoor spots available in the nearby town of Watseka. Please let us know on the form, and we will contact you. 

TIME & PHONES

One invitation of the festival is to experience a relationship with time that is connected with the land and isn't based on the unit-to-unit march of capitalistic time. For the duration of the festival, we will experiment with markers of time other than clock time to open, move through, and close events. If you'd like to participate in this immersively, during our opening circle, we will invite you to leave your phones and watches in a safe location to encourage you to look at them as little as possible. 

If you choose not to use the phone/watch box, whenever you do use your phone, please do so in as discrete, limited and mindful of a way as possible to facilitate our collective landing in the present. 

Regardless of whether you choose to use the phone/watch box, there is no public wifi and data is occasionally spotty. If emergency situations arise, please find a festival organizer. 

ACCESSIBILITY (a note from Zumwalt Acres)

We strive to make our gatherings as accessible as possible, but as a farm with limited infrastructure and resources, we have limits to the range of our accommodations. We are best able to accommodate our guests when you clearly communicate your access needs in advance, so please indicate in the RSVP form what will support you in being fully present and cared for during our gathering. 

Bathroom: We will have two composting toilets on the premises with toilet paper inside. There are a few stairs leading up to the toilet. 

Seating: We have a number of flexible folding chairs, barstools, metal chairs, and seat cushions. Priority for chairs and benches is always given to those for whom seats are an access need. We welcome attendees to bring personal seating options such as camping chairs that will help you be as comfortable as possible. 

Food: See above!

Activities: We offer a variety of activities varying in intensity levels and encourage people to engage in what feels appropriate for their needs.

Care team: Individuals who have volunteered to support community members in case of a difficult situation or need for support will be identifiable with a badge throughout the weekend. Please feel free to ask a care team member for support, whenever they are wearing their badge, and they will do their best to provide care and/or point you towards the resources you need.

Space: Many of the activities will take place on grassy areas, but all will have seating options. The land is flat, but sometimes bumpy. 

Weather: Weather might include high heat, high sun, and/or rain. Check the weather forecast when packing. When possible, we will gather in shaded areas, but expect to spend some time in the sun. In the case of rain, we will provide shelter as much as possible. 

Plant and animal friends:  Be cautious when touching unfamiliar plants, and don’t eat any plants or mushrooms on the land that you can’t confidently identify (feel free to ask a member of the ZA team and they can likely help you identify local plants and mushrooms!). Poison ivy and ticks can be found on the farm. We will let you know where to look out for them and how to identify them. Make sure to do tick checks at the end of each day and let a member of the care team know if you find a tick on you. You will hear coyotes at night, but they won’t come near. Raccoons, opossums, and other small animals may be around at night but they won’t bother you if you don’t bother them. Our chickens will be in their coop / pasture. They are friendly, feel free to say hi to them gently. 

PACKING LIST

• Tent

• Sleeping pad

• Sleeping bag

• Camp chair(s)

• Flashlight

• Sunscreen

• Sunglasses

• Hat

• Long pants (for poison ivy + tick protection)

• Long socks (for poison ivy + tick protection)

• Clothes for hot summer days

• Closed-toe shoes

• Camp shoes (flip flops, slides)

• Snacks

• Water bottle

• Bug repellant

PAYMENT

The cost of attending the festival is $180. This covers the cost of food and infrastructure, and supports the teachers and artists who are coming to share their knowledge and facilitate our co-creation of knowledge.

No one will be turned away for lack of funds. If you are not able to pay at this time, or you can pay less than the supported rate, we still lovingly welcome you. We trust that as a whole, our community will be able to support the material needs of this event.

Our tiers of support are as follows:

• $0 - BIPOC Free Access Fund

• $90 - SUPPORTED RATE: 50% scholarship

• $180 - STANDARD RATE: cost of attendance 

• $270 - SUPPORTER RATE: cost of attendance + support someone needing a 50% scholarship

• $360 - SUPER SUPPORTER RATE: cost of attendance + support someone needing a full scholarship

• $540 - ULTRA SUPPORTER RATE: cost of attendance + support someone needing a full scholarship + support a professional artist’s attendance, creating, and teaching

• $1080 - ULTIMATE SUPPORTER RATE: cost of attendance + support two people needing a full scholarship + support three professional artists’ attendance, creating, and teachin

BIPOC Free Access Fund - If you identify as a Black person, Indigenous person, Asian person, Latinx/o/a person, or someone who is not white or white-passing and has been marginalized and dispossessed by structures of power in the United States, you may choose this option to attend the festival free of cost. 

FURTHER QUESTIONS?

If you have any questions at all, please email us at landingmovement@gmail.com.