Agriculture Course Centennial Celebration — Webinar Series
June 7 & 10-16 (8 sessions)
9 - 10:30 am ET
To commemorate 100 years of Biodynamic Agriculture, and looking forward to our work into the future, we warmly invite you to participate in a series on how Rudolf Steiner’s ‘Spiritual Foundations for the Renewal of Agriculture’ has inspired various practitioners to develop their relationship to the land, their communities, and themselves.
Each day, June 7 and 10-16 (in direct relationship to the dates Steiner offered the original lectures 100 years ago), a new biodynamic practitioner and artist will work together to offer lively experiential sharings and artistic exercises that can help us all live more fully into the gifts contained in these foundational lectures that have inspired a worldwide movement.
Presenters
June 7: Carin Fortin and Delmar McComb
June 10: Stewart Lundy
June 11: Barbara Shinn
June 12: Cynthia and Harald Hoven
June 13: Simone Helmle
June 14: Cory Eichman
June 15: Jeff Poppen
June 16: Anthony Mecca and Chik Ying Chai
See below for bios.
Preparation
Having various simple art supplies (paper, pencils, coloring materials such as colored pencils, crayons, or pastels) and a space to do a little movement at hand is encouraged to be able to participate in the exercises.
Recordings
Recordings will be sent out to registrants after each session.
Registration
In a desire to make biodynamic education as accessible as possible, this webinar series is on a pay-what-you-can basis. Donations are greatly appreciated to cover the true cost and will help to support the development of future programming.
Presenters
Cory Eichman
Cory began apprenticing on biodynamic farms in 1992. He co-founded the Saugeen RIver CSA in 1997, an 80-acre mixed farm in Ontario, Canada. He has taught courses on spiritual science and biodynamics in the winters since 2005 through the Ontario Biodynamic Society, the Rudolf Steiner Centre Toronto, the Biodynamic Association, the Council of Anthroposophical Organizations, the Anthroposophical Society of America, and the Camphill Academy.
Carin Fortin
Carin Fortin, herb farmer, herbalist and teacher, is a member of the Circle of representatives at the Goetheanum Section of Agriculture and serves on the Council of the Agriculture Section North America. She is also active in the Santa Cruz/Monterey Bay Anthroposophical Society branch and as BDANC (Biodynamic Association of Northern California) member where she served as newsletter editor and core group member for many years. Together with her partner, Delmar McComb, she started and runs Blossom’s Biodynamic Herb Farm in Aromas, California.
Simone Helmle
Simone lives with her family in Stuttgart, Germany. She teaches the subjects Leadership, Socio-culture and Anthroposophy. She developed the master’s programme for resilient entrepreneurship in biodynamics at the Freie Landbauschule Bodensee e.V. in Überlingen, Germany and she led the educational programmes of the Demeter Academy of the Demeter Association in Germany for several years. She designed many exercises for working with biodynamic farmers in conversion. She ties the agricultural course with biographical questions and questions that also ground our human individuality in an farm organism. To do this, Simone works with eurythmy and colors. Originally, she is scientifically qualified in methods of adult education and client-centred counselling work. She has a doctorate in agriculturalsociology. It is a matter close to her heart to accompany people in the development of their individual potential.
Cynthia Hoven
Cynthia Hoven has over 35 years of experience working with anthroposophy, Waldorf education, and eurythmy. She travels widely across four continents to teach eurythmy, lecture on anthroposophical topics, and coach and mentor students.
Harald Hoven
Harald Hoven, founder and former director of Raphael Garden at Rudolf Steiner College in Fair Oaks, California, is a national and international consultant and educator for biodynamics, specializing in the farm individuality and preparation making. He was one of the original co-founders of the Biodynamic Association of Northern California (BDANC).
Stewart Lundy
Stewart has been farming since 2010 at Perennial Roots Farm where they make their own biodynamic preparations from animals and herbs grown on the farm. He raises cattle and sheep, tends a market garden, and runs a small CSA. He is the Managing Director of the Josephine Porter Institute for Applied Biodynamics, where many of the preparations for North America and beyond are produced. He offers consultations, workshops, and more.
Delmar McComb
Delmar McComb has been a student of Biodynamic Agriculture and Anthroposophy for over 30 years. He is co-owner with his partner Carin Fortin of Blossom's Farm, an integrated biodynamic farm which grows and processes herbs, vegetables into medicines, body care items, and nutritional powders. For years, he was Director of a large wholesale plant nursery in California with the plants sold and shipped throughout the West Coast. While there, he developed the only Demeter Certified Biodynamic line of nursery plants available from a commercial nursery in the country.
Anthony Mecca
Anthony Mecca is Co-Director of the Biodynamic Demeter Alliance and a farmer dedicated to healing the relationship between human beings and the earth through education, community building, research, and development. Over the past decade, he has developed and led training programs for the Biodynamic Association. As Co-Director, Anthony is responsible for programs and training, as well as working with the social arts towards building a more harmonious and vibrant biodynamic community. Anthony is also a director of EduCareDo where he offers a distance learning course on Biodynamic Agriculture and Nutrition and contributes to the Foundations in Anthroposophy course. Anthony works and lives on Sun Heart Farm, an educational and therapeutic community farm in the valley between the Berkshire and Taconic mountains in New York.
Jeff Poppen
Jeff Poppen, the Barefoot Farmer, is the owner and operator of one of the oldest and largest organic farms in Tennessee. At Long Hungry Creek Farm, he and his farm partners tend about six acres of vegetable crops, which they sell to wholesale buyers and to restaurants, and tend a herd of about 35 cattle. Jeff is the author of The Best of the Barefoot Farmer, The Best of the Barefoot Farmer II, and the newly-published Barefoot Biodynamics: How Cows, Compost, and Community Help Us Understand Rudolf Steiner’s Agriculture Course. In addition to his books, Jeff has produced TV shows (some episodes available on the Barefoot Farmer YouTube Channel), written newspaper columns, and lectured at garden clubs and organic conferences for over three decades. Jeff’s farm is the site of the annual Southeast Biodynamic Conference as well as other seasonal farm festivals.
Barbara Shinn
Barbara has embraced biodynamics for decades. While growing 20 acres of wine grapes on the North Fork of Long Island, NY she witnessed the power and beauty biodynamic practices bring to farmed land. Shortly after planting the vines, the land transformed from a silent, closed entity to a place of evolving complexity, welcoming wildlife, insects, and volunteer vegetation to coexist harmoniously. Barbara now resides in coastal Maine on 14 acres of field and woods with a rushing brook where she stewards the land biodynamically. She organizes the Nor’easter Maine biodynamic chapter, is a member of the Fellowship of Preparation Makers and continues to make the preparations at home. Barbara is Treasurer of the Board for the Josephine Porter Instituate for Applied Biodynamics.
