Touchstone Theatre's Festival UnBound to Return for its 6th Year

Touchstone Theatre will open its 2024-25 season with a sixth year of Festival UnBound: a five-day celebration full of arts-infused events, performances, and workshops for all. Featuring visual arts, live music, participatory dance, original theatre, community dialogue, and more; the Festival is a unique, hyper-local arts experience taking place from October 2-6 at venues throughout Bethlehem. Attendance is free for most events; select events have an admission fee. The Festival includes work by the Touchstone Ensemble, local artists and organizers, and internationally-acclaimed guest artists.

The first year of Festival UnBound took place in October 2019, twenty years after the closing of Bethlehem Steel, and explored questions of community and identity: Who are we, now that the Steel is gone? What are the challenges ahead, and what are the values that hold us together as we shape our future? Festival UnBound has since evolved into a five-day series of events taking place in streets, parks, and venues across Bethlehem and beyond: a celebration of arts for everyone who calls the Lehigh Valley home. “We say it every year, and it's true: Festival UnBound is a genuine community festival,” says Festival Director Mary Wright. “It's art of, by, and for the people of the Lehigh Valley.” 

A sampling of the delights you can expect at this year's Festival include Twilight with Touchstone, a multi-sensory experience (including a participatory light parade) at the Bethlehem Rose Garden that celebrates the places we grow community, and Fiesta UnBound, featuring upbeat Latin folk music, special community guests, and an interactive art-making activity that is fun for the whole family. Touchstone also welcomes two guest residencies this year, with disability arts ensemble Kinetic Light, who create, perform, design, and teach at the nexus of access, queerness, disability, and race; and London-based Single Shoe Productions, who combine visual storytelling, physical comedy, and a love for the absurd to create and tour original theatre for universal audiences. 

The centerpiece of the 2024 Festival is Kinetic Light's evening-length duet, DESCENT. Produced in collaboration with Zoellner Arts Center, DESCENT explores the pleasures of wheeled movement and reckless abandon. It is performed on a custom-designed architectural ramp installation with hills, curves, and peaks. Combining dance, architecture, design, and technology, this work challenges cultural assumptions of what disability, dance, and beauty can be. Inspired by the sensual writings and art of French sculptor Auguste Rodin, DESCENTgives the mythological characters of Venus and Andromeda new life as interracial lovers. Voted as 2018's most moving performance by the readers of Dance Magazine, DESCENT is “An ingenious set of ramps [that] serves as a canvas for projections of stars and seas, and as a surface for wheelchair motion with the gliding grace of ice dance,” according to The New Yorker.

Full 2024 Festival UnBound ScheduleMost events are FREE; donations are gratefully accepted. 

KINETIC LIGHT INTEGRATED DANCE WORKSHOP: LEVEL 1Wednesday Oct. 2, 4:30-6pm | DeSales UniversityWhen disabled and nondisabled movers enter the space, what can we create? This workshop invites you to explore your body in different ways, together. Learn the basics of integrated technique through deep investigation of our own moving bodies. Limited to 20 participants, so be sure to register at touchstone.org!

KINETIC LIGHT WORKSHOP: DANCE DESCENTWednesday Oct. 2, 7-8:30pm | DeSales UniversityThis repertory dance masterclass shares some of the lyrical floorwork and intricate, yet powerful, partnering work from DESCENT. Guided by Laurel Lawson and Alice Sheppard, discover how to embody the story and emotions which inspired DESCENT's stunning lifts and balances in your own body. Limited to 12 participants, so be sure to register at touchstone.org!

TWILIGHT WITH TOUCHSTONE: A Rose Garden ODYSSEYThursday Oct. 3 & Friday Oct. 4, 6-8pm | The Bethlehem Rose GardenAn interactive and immersive evening journey through the Bethlehem Rose Garden. Explore what it means to grow and nurture community as the park is brought to life through the magic of performance, music, poetry, dance, lighting, and more. FREE EVENT; come one, come all!

STARGAZINGThursday Oct. 3 & Friday Oct. 4, 8-9:30pm | The Bethlehem Rose GardenTake a break from the hustle and bustle, sit back, and enjoy the beautiful canvas of our night sky! Telescopes and Nature Nurture Center staff will be provided to guide you in viewing the stars, moon, and planets (dependent on favorable weather and viewing conditions). FREE EVENT; come one, come all!

REFLECTIONS ON THE RIVERSaturday Oct. 5, 9am-12:30pm | Sand Island Boat LaunchA guided canoe tour with our community partner, Wildlands Conservancy, where you'll learn more about the beauty of the Lehigh River that flows through Bethlehem and embark on a creative writing journey. Limited to 20 participants, so be sure to register at touchstone.org!

A WALL BETWEEN USSaturday Oct. 5 & Sunday Oct. 6, 2-3:30pm | The Charles A. Brown Ice House Tickets: $25. Pay-What-You-Will at the door. Visit touchstone.org or call 610.867.1689London-based performance company Single Shoe Productions' A Wall Between Us combines video projection, visual storytelling, and illusions to interweave three revealing stories– examining our need to belong to a place, how this affects us, others, and the land itself.

“THE BIG READ” LAUNCHSaturday Oct. 5, 6:30-7:30pm | Zoellner Arts CenterThe commencement of our Season-long programming, in partnership with the Bethlehem Area Public Library, centered around Sitting Pretty: The View from My Ordinary Resilient Disabled Body by Rebekah Taussig. Free copies of the book will be distributed as we share sneak peeks of our upcoming community engagement activities. FREE EVENT; come one, come all!

DESCENTSaturday Oct. 5, 7:30-9:30pm | Zoellner Arts CenterTickets: $35. Visit touchstone.org or call 610.867.1689DESCENT explores the pleasures of wheeled movement and reckless abandon. It is performed on a custom-designed architectural ramp installation with hills, curves, and peaks. Combining dance, architecture, design, and technology, this work challenges cultural assumptions of what disability, dance, and beauty can be.

INSIDE DISABILITY ARTS AND DESCENTSunday Oct. 6, 11am-12:30pm | Zoellner Arts CenterGet an insider's take: Kinetic Lights's Artistic Director Alice Sheppard opens up about the world of DESCENT, sharing choreographic and access practice, plus behind-the-scenes artistic info. FREE EVENT; advance registration is encouraged at touchstone.org.

“ANOTHER POINT OF VIEW: 4 VISUALLY IMPAIRED ARTISTS” EXHIBIT RECEPTIONSunday Oct. 6, 2-4pm | Bethlehem Town Hall Rotunda GalleryThe Bethlehem Fine Arts Commission presents an invitational exhibition that highlights the work of four visually impaired artisans with varying degrees of vision who use their personal creative process as a means of self expression and inspiration. Join us for the Opening Reception, co-hosted by Touchstone Theatre. FREE EVENT; come one, come all!

TALES FROM THE TRAILSunday Oct. 6, 2:30-4pm | Amphitheater on the GreenwayA reflective stroll along the Greenway on the Southside of Bethlehem with our community partner, the Delaware & Lehigh National Heritage Corridor. While we stroll, Touchstone will guide you in a creative writing prompt. FREE EVENT; advance registration is encouraged at touchstone.org.

FIESTA UNBOUND: A COMMUNITY JAMSunday Oct. 6, 4-6pm | Touchstone's Barrio StageCome celebrate and dance with us at this family-friendly music-centered event with interactive art making, where you get to participate in as much or little as you want to (bring along your instrument)! The “house band” will be the upbeat Latin folk group Herencia Jibera, led by Daniel Class and featuring traditional music from Puerto Rico and more. FREE EVENT; come one, come all! 

Everybody is welcome at Festival UnBound! For questions about accessibility or to inquire about accommodations, contact the Festival's Accessibility Coordinator, Jacqui Schwartz at jacqui@touchstone.org.

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