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2009 Review

2008 Review

2008 SEEDS Community Site

Photo by: Karen Schaffman

SEEDS Festival is a unique interdisciplinary summer festival dedicated to arts and ecology. SEEDS features workshops, collaborative design projects, live performances, films, panel discussions, interdisciplinary investigations, and an archiving project. SEEDS cultivates innovative practices, by researching the connections between green, embodiment, justice, interconnectivity, reflection, investigation, art, science, and sacred.

Details on SEEDS 2010 coming soon!

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2009 Review

SEEDS Festival (Somatic Experiments in Earth, Dance, + Science) is an interdisciplinary arts and ecology festival initiated at Earthdance Workshop and Retreat Center, in Plainfield, MA. SEEDS Festival gathers artists, scientists, community activists, spiritual leaders, permaculture practitioners, and more, for a several weeks of workshops, films, lectures, residencies, and performances. Through this gathering, widely varied styles and approaches of interdisciplinary practice were presented, and new forms emerged, embodying the biodiversity we sought to create. It is the interaction and communication amongst a wide variety of life that strengthens the networks of our planet, of artistic practice, and of social interaction and community engagement.

SEEDS 2009 focused on potentiality. Potential for new growth is generated in places where diverse organisms meet. In this year of potential political change, we invited this phenomenon into our interdisciplinary investigations, setting up social experiments:

In the first week, we had several workshops and a mini-festival in the fields of dance research and practice, sustainable technology, liberation ecology, and mycological remediation. The teachers included Jennifer Monson, Simon Whitehead, Rafter Sass, and Skott Kellog. The weekend mini-festival was dedicated to Green/Body/Local and CI as a social experiment. The teachers included: Sondra Loring and Kavitha Rao, Karl Kronin, Camille Renarhd and Mark Moti Zemelman, Kristin McArdle, Neige Christenson, Dan Bear Davis and Sarah Day, Tamin Totzke and Dustin Haug, and a Global Underscore facilitated by Spirit Joseph.

In the second week, we invited a group of independent resident artists and scientists to work in the retreat space, inviting them to collaborate with the land and with one another as was their interest. Rather than a typical format of expecting production, we invited artists to see what emerged from the uniqueness of the event. The artists participating were: Camille Renarhd, Chris Peck, Emily Moore, Gabriel Forestieri, Kayoko Nakajima, Kythe Heller, Lailye Weidman, Marissa Perel, Mark “Moti” Zemelman, Sakura Shimada. As part of this event, we invited artist mentors Daria Fain, Robert Kocik, and Beverly Naidus to present their work and be available as guides for the artistic research. Artist and 2008 SEEDS co-curator Jen Harmon facilitated the week's residency.

Our Public Programming included films, lectures, workshops and performances, culminating in a final Community Day where participating artist residents shared their research findings in the form of performance, film, installations, and participatory projects. Additional events featured as Public Events included Lee Fogel's Wishing Garden, Tish Petrushka's Earth Magic, a film on Wangari Maathai by Lisa Merton and Alan Dater, a 350.org gathering connected internationally, a panel facilitated by Marissa Perel, a fieldtrip lecture demonstration at Tsegyalgar East, a Global Underscore, and films selected by Olive Bieringa.

The SEEDS Festival investigates arts and ecological research from a variety of fields of inquiry. It proposes several notions: that the intelligence of embodiment has specific offerings for our understanding of ecology, that artistic practice is a valuable tool and vehicle for this research, that when experiential research is shared, discussed, and archived, it indeed can benefit from and for this interaction, and that socially engaged research can mutually support the arts and the regenerative practices for the earth.

SEEDS Co-Founders

Margit Galanter and Olive Bieringa of the BodyCartography Project

SEEDS 2009 Director & Earthdance Site Lead

Margit Galanter

2009 Co-Curators

Margit Galanter, Melinda Buckwalter, and Olive Bieringa.

SEEDS 2009 Team

Archivists: Lead: Rachel Boggia, with Ali Essekali, Julia Handsuch, and curators; Earthdance Co-Director : Spirit Joseph; Support Staff: Design and PR maven - Melle Dragon; Office Manager – Rek Kwawer; SEEDS intern – Dana Albertson; Summer Support and Earthdance Staff – Ben Robins, Sarah Worden, Kelly Mariani, Jacqueline Rubinstein, Justin Manocchia , Kalyan Uprichard, Keren Ganin-Pinto, Roy Saguenbomb, Ania Witwitzka, Ti Knoepfel, and others.

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2008 Review

The focus of SEEDS 2008 was ecology. In basic terms, ecology studies the interactions of organisms with their environment and with one other. It is a rich term because it highlights feedback and interdependence. A broad use of ecology invokes the connections between realms as diverse as the natural world, social landscapes, human behavior, and imagination. Through the theme, the Festival explored ecology both as a subject of inquiry, an approach, and a metaphor, thereby inviting new applications and research.

The SEEDS Festival was comprised of workshops, performances, panel discussions, land projects, and generated artistic investigations, forming a unique and vital organism.

You can taste some of these findings by visiting our living SEEDS blog- http://seedsfestival.ning.com/ or check out Margit Galanter on SEEDS 2008, interviewed by Marlon Barrios Solano on www.dance-tech.net at http://www.dance-tech.net/video/1462368:Video:21165

2008 Teachers, Facilitators & Panelists

Andrew de L. Harwood, Andrew Faust, Arawana Hayashi, Aaron Jessup, The BodyCartography Project, Bruce Hooke, Bryce Beverlin, Chris Aiken, Christopher Weidman, Claudia Wittman, Dana Salisbury, Daniel Lepkoff, Daniel Roth, Elaine Colandrea, Emmanuelle Pepin, Dr. Enoch Page, Jane Vorburger, Jen Harmon, Jennifer Monson, John Jasperse, Jonah Bokaer, Kanta Kochhar-Lindgren, Karen Nelson, Kate Bailey, Lailye Weidman, Liana Foxvog, Mark Lakeman, Martha Eddy, Marlon Barrios-Solano, Melle Dragon, Melinda Buckwalter, Ku and Dancers, Nala Walla, Olive Bieringa, Olivier Besson, Susan Schell, Suprapto Suryodarmo, Susan Sgorbati, Tamara Ashley, Terre Unité Parker, Tony Vacca

2008 Festival Curators

Jen Harmon, Olive Bieringa, Margit Galanter, Mark “Moti” Zemelman, and Shira Lynn W*

2008 Festival Support and Artistry

Earthdance Staff : Ben Robins, Christine Yee, Eryn Rosenthal, Hannah McCarger* , Jason Comcomwich*, Margit Galanter, Mark Messer, Rek Kwawer, Shira Lynn W*, and Spirit Joseph

Administrative Support : Anneliese Moordhorst. Archivists: Melinda Buckwalter, Sandra Yee + Tamara Ashley; Graphic Designer : Alicia Marvan; International Research and Support : Diane Butler, Rachel Cooper (Asia Society), and the Waka Foundation. Production Assistant : Sarah Worden; Project Director : Margit Galanter; + Publicity Designer: Melle Dragon