YOGA • MOVEMENT • NATURE • ART
An invitation to join us for our planted retreat in the Italian countryside. Immersed among fields of olive, cherry, and almond trees.
Join us for our planted retreat from 1st to 3rd of September at Masseria Cultura, in Apulia, Italy. The masseria provides the perfect space to be secluded from day-to-day life and reflect on our inner world. Surrounded by nature, we will begin a journey of understanding and realigning ourselves with its movements. Masseria Cultura was originally built in 1510, historically called “Masseria Lesting” as a tower of defense and sightseeing of the city.
The space is managed by young artists who are very sensitive towards environmental, sustainable, and ecological issues, as well as promoting a vegan and vegetarian diet with the products they themselves grow on the organic land that the Masseria has.
The place itself provides a perfect opportunity to seclude oneself from day-to-day life and reflect on their inner world. Surrounded by nature, through this retreat, we will take you on a journey to understand and realign yourself with the movements and rhythms of the Earth.
The retreat focuses on Incorporating various kinds of movements, from yoga and dance to breathwork, will play an essential role in bringing forward this idea of slowly resettling into our beings, embracing our personal journey as humans and as nature.
Guided by our own creative instincts, we will host art therapy and creative lab sessions, with our goal being to understand the role of creativity in healing and fostering beauty in the world. Our principles of observation, togetherness and transformation will shape these activities into a wholesome group experience.
We will walk slowly and barefoot. Morning meditation will rekindle a sense of oneness with the Earth, as we practice grounding, inhaling and exhaling with a mindful approach.
We recognise the role of food in nourishing our mind, body, and soul.
The food will be prepared with locally sourced fruits and vegetables to have minimal impact on the land and high nutritional value for the body. We will prepare vegan and vegetarian meals with love, care, and respect for the body and our planet.
We will create a safe space to share, create, and cultivate our inner voice of empowerment. We welcome everyone with an open mind, regardless of gender, colour, or age; we have no barriers.
Our days will include plenty of time for you to relax, practice silence, read a book, or just gaze at nature.
How to reach
Masseria Cultura, Str. Vicinale Foggiali, 8, 70014 Conversano BA
By train: take a train to Bari Central Station and a bus to Conversano town.
By car: reach Conversano town; from there, it takes 10 minutes to drive to Masseria.
By flight: fly to Bari, take a shuffle to Bari Central Station, and take a bus to Conversano.
You will be guided by facilitators that work closely with the natural world and empower social movement with holistic living.
Facilitators & Sessions
Martha Hincapié Charry
Sara Francesca Hillebrand
Catherine Leo
Martha Hincapié Charry is a Colombian BIPOC artist, choreographer, performer, and independent curator based in Berlin. She reflects on the processes of decolonization and indigenization, as well as on the critical relationship between humans and nature and the visible and invisible worlds.
Sessions
Hearts
Hearts opens up a space to meet in an intimate and close dialogue, where we’ll make, through movement, a reflection about our bodies and their actual state, putting the focus on our hearts, the first functional organ we developed and started to beat and pump blood inside our bodies at about three weeks. As a muscle, it is the origin of movement.
We will begin and close the session with a meditation of the heart. From there, we will take this muscle through space, emotions, and memories in movement.
“Hearts is space for subjective notions in the relationship between self, society, and body, moving as a group, experiencing collective power, or dancing duets or solos, unfolding an instant creation.”
foRest -Slow Medicine
Starting with the activation of the body in movement in relation to the four elements, we will generate a dance that will place the power of the four elements within us. To subsequently direct us towards slowness as a healing process: deactivating the body, leaving the burden of daily life behind—”foRest—Slow Medicine” opens a space of deceleration.
Artist Martha Hincapié Charry carves out a space dedicated to slowing down and regeneration, inviting us to reflect upon the connection between the current crisis of our natural resources and our relationship to a moment’s pause.
‘’foRest – slow medicine is focused on openness to being barefoot and coming into contact with the earth.’’
Sara-Francesca Hillebrand is a sociologist and psychodynamic art therapist. Her projects and courses combine personal growth and the relationship with the natural environment to facilitate an experience of profound empathy and harmony between the different forms of life.
Session
The transformation Inside and Outside of Us
We will explore the local garden in search of traces of transformation in nature. Followed by capturing these momentary transformations with the ancient Japanese technique of Suminagashi: a succession of suggestive images created on the surface of the water.
Through our relationship with nature, we will reflect on what different forms of transformation have occurred and what perceptions they arouse in us.
Catherine Leo is a visual artist whose work and research focus on the relationship between time-based media and the subconscious. In addition to the aesthetic and technical aspects of art as creativity, she focuses on the emotional aspect of it, expanding on the therapeutic role of art and its healing power.Session
Weaving the Elements of Nature
We will begin by collecting elements of nature and weaving them collectively in a space that reflects our ideas of creativity, community, and our connection to the Earth. Each participant will interpret the sentiments, bringing their emotions to a physical and tangible dimension through collective art. The result will be a portal for all the individual and collective experiences, which will allow us to process and integrate our journeys during the retreat.
Ankit Kokil
Shyam Sundar
Priyanka Singh
Ankit Kokil is a dedicated yoga teacher from India with a wealth of experience in the field. His style is characterized by his ability to blend traditional wisdom with contemporary approaches, creating a harmonious balance between the mind, body, and spirit.Session
Understanding the Wisdom of Nature through Yoga
Nature has a way of offering us its wisdom and healing energy. We will aim to open up to this wisdom through yoga so that we can enhance our well-being, find inspiration, and cultivate a deeper sense of unity with the natural world.
Each pose unlocks a new understanding of the soul and its connection to the life force. With this thought, yoga will become a medium to deepen our relationship with the natural world and recognize our energy within the Earth’s energy. We will practice outdoors to make this connection and harmonize our body, mind, and spirit with the elements of nature. The practice will be followed by a grounding meditation and breathing awareness to establish awareness and mindfulness, allowing us to experience a profound sense of unity with our surroundings.
Stefano Galizia (aka Shyam Sundar) is a musician based in Milan, Italy. His music centers around meditation, mantras, and spirituality. He started learning music when he was four, and his sounds cultivate a deep awareness of oneself while connecting with the divine.Session
Connecting with the Divine through Kirtan
Kirtan is a practice of sound yoga (nada yoga), belonging to the branch of yoga of the heart (bhakti yoga), aimed at opening and harmonizing the heart, mind, and body.
We practice together the chanting of mantras (vibrations that expand and purify the mind), mainly in the Sanskrit language (Devanagari, the language of the sages), in group form, accompanied by instruments and sounds from East and West.
Each mantra invokes one of the multiple forms of the divine, which resides in our hearts. When we recite these sounds, the vibration awakens this kind of unity consciousness in us.
The practice takes place in a circle, and the song is composed by the voice of each participant, accompanied by different instruments that will help us enter the song.
Priyanka Singh is an Indian writer, art director, and curator based in Milan,Italy. Her work focuses on the connection between humans and nature. In the moment of the current ecological crisis, she aims to bring forward this sacred and intimate relationship with Earth as a healing practice.Session
The Stories of Nature Spirit
We will begin understanding Prana—breathe—the life force and how this movement connects with that of a tree. After creating this sacred space of interconnectedness, we will reflect on the stories of nature spirit. These stories create a sense of the divine and could be a channel to understand eco-spirituality. It will aim for calmness in an epoch of climate change and injustice.
We will close this circle with kautuka–a protective thread used for worship, and tie it around the tree to cultivate a sense of protection and alignment with the nature spirit.
The bedrooms are curated with minimal aesthetics to keep your mind at ease. We have two shared rooms available and one room for a couple. However, the masseria has plenty of space in case you need some alone time to reflect on your journey.
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