Shared Earth Flowing Water: Seed

Event Date: May 16, 2026 (2PM)

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Gather in community to celebrate spring awakening and new growth with music, dance, and native prairie planting in this free, all-ages performance and stewardship event by Irene Hsiao and collaborators in partnership with Chinese American Museum of Chicago, Chinese Fine Arts Society, the Field Museum, and Chicago Park District's Night Out in the Parks.

Dress comfortably for the outdoors. Gloves, native prairie plants, and planting tools will be provided.

Shared Earth Flowing Water: Seed

2:00-2:45PM Performance

3:00-4:00PM Planting

Set in Stone Gathering Space in the Burnham Wildlife Corridor

FREE

Set in Stone is one of three Gathering Spaces in the Burnham Wildlife Corridor (BWC), a 100-acre ribbon of urban wilderness running through one of Chicago's premier lakefront properties, Burnham Park. The BWC is one of the Chicago Park District’s largest natural areas and is representative of the native prairie, savanna and woodland ecosystems of this region.

About the Artists

Irene Hsiao is a dancer, writer, and multidisciplinary artist. She creates site-specific participatory performance installations, a practice that experiments with place and environment, created and found objects, projections, community art, dance, and other live performance. Currently, she is working on Shared Earth Flowing Water, a performance series dedicated to peace, community, and the natural world.  She is the 2026 Artist in Residence at the Chinese Fine Arts Society, inaugural Artist in Residence at the Smart Museum, first Artist in Residence at 21c Museum Hotel Chicago, first Resident Artist at Heritage Museum of Asian Art, 2022-23 Fellow at High Concept Labs, and a 2025 Radicle Resident at Hyde Park Art Center.

Antonius-Tín Bui is a polydisciplinary artist and shapeshifter invested in the transformative potential of improvisation, portraiture, craft, and ritual. A monsoon in a past life, they see themself most in movement—in wind, in the shifting blues of the sky, in the quiet sway between presence and disappearance. The child of Paul and Van Bui, two Vietnamese refugees who carved futures from grief and grit, Antonius-Tín carries their legacy in every gesture. Their work honors the spectral, the tender, and the unruly—crafting portals for what cannot be named, only felt, only danced with ancestral shadow.

Hunter Diamond is a creative woodwind and sound artist based in Chicago. Though he is most at home in the improvised music scene, a mixture of conceptual, composed, and improvised performance keeps him perpetually present in the interdisciplinary Chicago creative arts community. In 2021 Diamond founded Curio Records, which serves as the primary outlet for his recorded work. 2026 will see the release of several new recordings including the debut album from Public Sentiment, the fifth album from Black Diamond, and a string quintet about Israel/Palestine.

Amanda Maraist is a dancemaker and performance community advocate making performance work and arts programming in Chicago. Her work synthesizes mutualism, play, world-building, and ethnographic research into practical somatic strategies for thriving. She simultaneously produces her own artistic performance work while also co-directing bim bom studios; an accessible, sliding scale hourly movement rehearsal + performance space in Belmont Cragin. These two efforts exist in symbiotic tandem: creating performance that is collaborative and accessible - as well as creating physical spaces within the dance ecosystem that fill gaps left by evaporating institutions. Her commitment to support the community, and the strategies employed to arrive at something that both survives and thrives, show up in the aesthetics and actions of her performance and the spaces she imagines.

Kedgrick Pullums, Jr. (he/they) is a Chicago-based woodwind specialist, multi-instrumentalist, composer/arranger, and educator whose primary instrument is the flute. His artistry spans classical, jazz, contemporary, and cross-cultural traditions, and he is recognized for his versatility across the full woodwind family while bringing a distinctive, lyrical voice to the flute. As both a performer and composer/arranger, Kedgrick is deeply drawn to musical improvisation as a form of communication—a way of listening, responding, and building connection that transcends boundaries of style or genre. Alongside performance, Kedgrick maintains a thriving private teaching studio in Chicago, where he instructs woodwinds, piano, and voice. His work as an educator emphasizes accessibility, creativity, and representation for students of diverse backgrounds.

Darling “Shear” Squire is a Chicago native with Atlanta roots and trained in Ballet, Modern, Jazz and African. After high school, Darling began dancing professionally with Bubba Carr, Cher’s choreographer, Rhonda Henriksen, Twyla Tharp, Tracy Vogt, Hinton Battle, and Lauri Stallings. As a freelance dancer/ choreographer, Darling has worked with The Fly Honeys, Soho House Chicago, EXPO Chicago, Cerqua Rivera Dance Theatre, MCA, Salonathon, Open TV and many others. Awards include: Impulstanz Between Gestures scholarship (Vienna, Austria), Chicago Dancemakers Forum Lab Artist, CDF 10X10 Choreographer, Links Hall CoMission Fellowship, 3Arts nominee (2019, 2022). Darling's career has been one with a strong spiritual center and allowance of universal well-being.

About the Partnering Organizations

Roots & Routes is an initiative aimed at co-creating and sustaining the BWC, in order to support native plants, wildlife and nearby communities. Project partners collaborate based upon a shared commitment to improving the quality of life for residents through strengthening their culturally relevant connections to vital green spaces. The Roots & Routes collective includes large institutions such as the Park District, Field Museum and The Nature Conservancy, as well as artists and many community-based organizations serving the predominantly Black, Latinx, and Chinese-American neighborhoods close to the BWC.

The Chinese-American Museum of Chicago (CAMOC) exists to steward the stories and histories of Chinese Americans through exhibitions, education, art, and research, particularly in the Midwest. In collaboration with artists, scholars, and organizations across the country, CAMOC is building a community that broadens the dialogue around the varied and evolving Chinese American experience, culture, and contributions.

Chicago Park District's Night Out in the Parks program presents cultural events year-round in neighborhood parks throughout the city. The Chicago Park District in partnership with 100 local artists and organizations, presents engaging events and performances that enhance quality of life across Chicago and amplify the artistic and cultural vibrancy in every neighborhood. Through multiple disciplines, which include theater, music, movies, dance, site-specific work, nature programs, and community festivals, the series aims to support Chicago-based artists, facilitate community-based partnerships and programs, cultivate civic engagement, and ensure equity in access to the arts for all Chicagoans.

The Field Museum's Keller Science Action Center strives to transform threatened landscapes into resilient conservation corridors, supporting community-driven conservation stewardship, with connectivity, nature, and human well-being at the forefront of our priorities. Grounded in people-centered, action-oriented science, we collaborate with local communities and a wide range of partners to support conservation areas that are both equitable and enduring. Through the Museum’s science, resources, training, and on-the-ground mentoring, we strengthen local stewardship and co-develop inclusive networks that align culturally relevant knowledge with nature-based solutions. Together, these efforts build lasting, connected conservation mosaics across regions and generations.

The Chinese Fine Arts Society is an organization dedicated to the preservation and promotion of Chinese and AAPI arts. For the past four decades, CFAS has introduced the cultural wealth of China and the Asian diaspora to Chicago and the Midwest through our performances, community engagement, and educational programming. By hosting events at major venues such as Millennium Park, the Art Institute, the Chicago Cultural Center, and Navy Pier, CFAS has reached thousands of people and increased awareness of Chinese and Asian diasporic cultures across generations. From concert halls to libraries, nursing homes, parks, and community centers, CFAS aims to engage diverse audiences and foster cultural understanding.

This program is supported in part by the Chinese Fine Arts Society and presented as part of the Chicago Park District's Night Out in the Parks series, supported by the Mayor's Office and the Chicago Department of Cultural Affairs and Special Events.

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