Touching Ground is a multi-year, multi-faceted learning and creative process about the Indigenous and layered histories and contemporary landscapes of the place called Toronto –  to gain a deeper understanding of where we are and how we got here.

Touching Ground grew out of Jumblies Scarborough residency and 2011 production of Like An Old Tale. It was not so much a project as an integral impulse or commitment that would through all that we did. When we moved to the The Ground Floor in 2014, in the new downtown development of CityPlace, this became the central thread of our work in our new neighbourhood, around the city and farther afield.

This process culminated in the Touching Ground Festival in Spring 2017: a suite of original multi/inter-disciplinary art works, unified by our themes. All the new works and events feature community members as art-makers, singers, dancers and performers, and many artists from Jumblies and our partners.

Funders: Canada Council for the Arts, Ontario Arts Council, Toronto Arts Council, Ontario Trillium Foundation, Metcalf Foundation, J.P. Bickell Foundation, Inspirit Foundation, Ontario Ministry of Tourism, Culture and Sport, Ontario 150, Toronto Foundation, Theatre Ontario.

A suite of new works inspired by three years of exploring themes of Toronto’s layered and Indigenous histories and present landscapes. All works and events feature community members as art-makers, singers, dancers and performers, and many artists from Jumblies and our partners.

Festival Launch Weekend
Saturday 13 May, 2-6 pm, The Ground Floor and neighbourhood

• On Tuesdays Audio Tour Launch – by Kyle Brenders and Ange Loft
• Walking Treaties Short Film Premiere – video by Adrienne Marcus Raja, soundtrack by Arie Verhuel-van de Ven, from a project with Alpha Alternative School
• CityPlace Chronicles Retrospective Exhibition Opening
• Dance Explorations at Canoe Landing Park & Under the Gardiner
• Soft CityPlace at Fort York Library, for the very young & all ages

Sunday 14 May, 2-5, Activities and Exhibition at The Ground Floor and Library

Four Lands Evolving Gallery

May 16 to 28, Evergreen Brick Works, Open artmaking drop-ins, times TBA

Four Lands Performance with Continuum Contemporary Music
Saturday 3 June, 2 pm and 7 pm and Sunday 4 June, 2 pm, Evergreen Brick Works

including new musical works composed by Juliet Palmer and Jason Doell

What Was My Backyard?
Friday 17 May, 7 pm,The Ground Floor, Saturday 27 May, 2:30 pm, Cedar Ridge Creative Centre, Scarborough
A work-in-progress musical for young people, composed by Britta Johnson, directed by Beth Helmers, music director Shifra Cooper, Metis fiddle tunes from Alyssa Delbaere-Sawchuk

The View From Here
Tuesday 13 June, 7 pm, The Ground Floor  

• Premiere of The View From Here, a short comic opera film, music by Norbert Palej, film by Sofia Bohdanowicz, libretto by Liz Rucker, comic art by Miranda Sharp
• Also screening Walking Treaties (see above)
• Presentation and conversation about composers, film/video and community arts
  Launch of Museum of Found Objects, a book of comics by Miranda Sharp

Talking Treaties and Under the Concrete

An Installation and Spectacle about Toronto’s Treaty histories and current implications, paired with a new choral work, inspired by the same themes and material.
Friday 23 June, 6:30-8:30 pm and Sunday 25 June, 5-7 pm, Historic Fort York
Talking Treaties Lead Artist and Director: Ange Loft, with Historian Victoria Freeman.

Under The Concrete composer Martin van de Ven, with original songs by Rosary Spence

… as well as great collaborative events with our Offshoots & Partners