Becoming Community is composed of a diverse group of humans, from children to elders, from artists to earthworkers, from academics to farmers, from settlers to Indigenous people of these lands. Our long-term vision is to continue growing an inter-generational and inter-cultural hub for people willing and wanting to bridge these worlds by sharing knowledge and resources as we try to make sense of the paradigm shifts ahead.
We are moving at the speed of trust so that future generations can inherit a project founded on principles of resilience and reciprocity, and bound by legal, financial and social agreements that respect the web of life and uphold relationships with integrity. No small feat!
We acknowledge that this may not happen in the lifetime of our founding members, yet this is the heart compass that drives our decisions as we heal the wounds of colonialism in our bodies and stories.
Among the humans facilitating this project are the ones willing to be known, and the ones who prefer to remain anonymous. This project also convenes a growing number of organizations, artists and change-makers from across Canada who have an established public presence as well as grassroots movements who are often unseen and unknown by choice.
We are all bound by our commitment to this land while holding a multiplicity of knowledge sets and lineages. We are not trying to solve the world’s problems and do not pretend to have any ultimate solutions. Instead, we are (un)learning how to be better accomplices in the collective struggle for liberty and sovereignty while co-creating a community that seeks a healthy, joyful and just future.
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Of Turtle Clan from Wikwemikong Unceded Territory, Vivian is a proud Anishinaabe mother and grandmother whose spirit name is Bigasohn Kwe. A survivor of the 60’s scoop and Indian Day School, she reconnected with her culture through work with Elders to help heal the impacts of residential schools and colonization. As a nurse and Indigenous health promoter for over 30 years, she delivers Indigenous knowledge and culture in non-judgemental ways to vulnerable people. She is the Elder in Residence at Toronto’s SikKids Hospital and the lead Indigenous Health Promoter at Parkdale Queen West Community Health Centre. Vivian leads Medicine Wheel Garden workshops, Full Moon teachings, Water Walks, Land ceremonies, and is a big advocate for children and youth. She is the co-founder of Indigenous Land Stewardship Circle, and acts as a consultant for the City of Toronto’s Urban Forestry and Indigenous Affairs offices. She will always have a responsibility as a helper to Elders, Grandmother Moon and Mother Earth.
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HearthCare considerations for Becoming Community are bottom-lined by Angell Owens, a cook/caterer and organizer from so-called Ottawa, Ontario. Passionate about the intersection of food and wellness, Angell is seasoned in medicine making, off-grid kitchenery and allergen friendly menu design and execution. She/they strives to co-create accessible, nourishing and delicious dishes and concoctions centered on ingredients produced by our neighbours, as well as sourced (foraged and cultivated) within the gardens, fields and forests of the Becoming Community land. Outside of nourishing bellies, Angell endeavors to empower community by committing acts of art and holding spaces for learning, exploration and relational weaving.
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A dancer, artist, mother and lover, Ayelen conspires to create spaces and rituals of belonging as though all life depends on it. She is co-founder and artistic accomplice of The Wandering Eye, River Rising, Indigenous Land Stewardship Circle, and Becoming Praxis, and is committed to choreographing communities of kinship and weaving human and more-than-human…
With over 30 years of experience in artistic creation, somatic education, and community building, she now cross-pollinates with the systems needed in this great transition: gardening, healing, myth-making and dancing through the unknown. Leading with love, nurturing relationships of trust and modeling repair with grace are among the skills she brings to these fields.
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Elenna moves at the intersection of story, land, and collective transformation. With roots in theatre and a devotion to creative disruption, she brings a tapestry of practices and experience to this project. She is a trained Co-Active leader and coach, and is currently the Associate Director of Experiential Design for the Co-Active Training Institute where she designs and leads transformational programs for human development. Elenna has found grounding and reclamation of her Jewish ancestry in the earth based-traditions of the ancient Kohenets (priestesses), and believes in the opportunity and beauty of creating life through queer kinship. She is the co-artistic collaborator with Ayelen Liberona of Becoming Praxis, and a founding member of River Rising. Elenna's work is shaped by years of experimenting with how we live, create, and care together. Elenna designs and holds spaces that invite truth-telling, myth-making, and the messy, beautiful work of becoming. Her presence is an offering of soulful strategy, poetic pragmatism, and unshakeable devotion to a more relational, liberated world.
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Born and raised in Southern Ontario and now living in maritime Canada, Greg has a lifelong interest in ecology, food systems and human well being. He brings expertise in biological farming and regenerative systems, soil microbiology, and permaculture design. Greg has worked on projects at the nexus of food security, cultural resilience, and political empowerment. For a decade, he worked with First Nations communities in the Yukon on housing and infrastructure, and before that worked for years with ngos on focused on housing and food security. Today, he owns Soil Wise Regenerative Land Care, a consultancy helping growers adopt biological farming methods. A passionate advocate for food sovereignty, Greg believes in solutions that honour both ecological and community well-being.
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Ian James Newton is an artist, musician and cultural craftsman who produces social experiments that surprise, nourish and offer neglected facets of our humanity a momentary unfolding. Forever on the edges, and critically leaning away from the conventional, his inspired relational environments disarm and reconnect. Ian founded and maintains Zero to One; a much loved art studio he established in 2000 which offers affordable and architecturally inspiring space to emerging artists and creatives. From Zero to One he launched the much lauded Blue Dot series; a multidisciplinary immersive experiences known for their depth, fidelity and lingering resonance.
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Lindy weaves theatre, coaching, Gestalt psychotherapy, mystical Judaism, and a dash of summer camp mischief into her work. She crafts (always logistically sound) spaces that are equal parts playground and temple — containers for risk, revelation, and laughter. Whether directing, facilitating, project managing, or scheming up wild ideas, Lindy works where story meets spirit, and where transformation hides in plain sight.
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A witch, weirdo, and wanderer, Rachelle is a wildling at heart, rooted in the rhythms of the Earth. A permaculturist, earthworker, cook, and community organizer, they weave magic through the soil, meals, and movements that nurture and nourish people and planet. Working through an intersectional, anti-colonial, anti-fascist, anti-oppression lens, they create audioscapes, write, and teach with intention, always seeking deeper truths. Dancing and laughing, they honour the divinity in all living beings, while fasting and embracing silence to reconnect with self and the sacred. Through these practices, they embody both rebellion and reverence in the ongoing journey of self and spirit.
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Rehana Tejpar is a facilitator, leadership coach, mediator, and movement artist who supports leaders and organizations to connect deeply with their authentic leadership, wholeness, vision, and intuition. She brings over 15 years of experience midwifing transformative journeys with individuals and groups, guiding their evolutionary movements with care, wisdom, and creativity.
Rehana is a founder at Bloom Consulting, where she strengthens the creative and collaborative brilliance of leaders and teams to move forward wisely and inclusively, together. At River Rising, Rehana brings her love of shared leadership, conflict transformation, and dance, along with the playful spirit of clowning and a deep spiritual connection to the land and her ancestors.
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Mick is a queer white settler of Scottish descent whose work weaves together teaching, making by hand, and nurturing relationships. With years of experience in furniture making, carpentry, and fine art, they bring both skill and creativity to their practice. As a teacher guiding young people toward careers in the skilled trades, Mick centres trust and relationship-building as essential to meaningful learning.
Their witchy side draws on intuition and ancestral threads, holding a deep connection to water, land, and spirit. Whether in the workshop, classroom, or community, Mick offers honesty, creativity, and a grounded presence. They show up fully, name what they see with care, and contribute in ways that foster genuine connection and create space for real and lasting change.
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Born and raised in Kyiv, Ukraine during the Soviet regime, Slava Sapershteyn is a registered Gestalt psychotherapist, systems engineer, storyteller and sacred clown. For over two decades, she has been curating and co-creating healing, playful and provocative spaces and experiences uniting artists, musicians, circus performers and philosophers. As a settler, humanist and systems thinker, she enriches the Becoming Community project with transformative and trauma-informed expertise, honed at the Gestalt Institute of Toronto. Rooted in somatic practices and relational engineering, Slava explores the edges and shadows of social and inter-personal dynamics, towards a deeper understanding of Self and Other. She also loves dancing, foraging wordsmithing, growing food, playing musical instruments and learning from wild fungi as masters of complex systems.
Slava Sapershteyn, RP(q) | Registered Psychotherapist | Gestalt Psychotherapy
Becoming Community was made possible with generous support from the Canada Council for the Arts and the Ontario Arts Council.