turn towards life: a queer birth story and gathering
Saturday, October 24th, 2026
10:00 AM - 2:00 PM
Sorenson Unity Center (1383 S 900 W, Salt Lake City, UT 84104)
you are invited to an intimate morning of workshops, film, art installation, discussion, and song.
Turn Towards Life: A Queer Birth Story and Gathering is a multimedia journey through a queer experience of conception, gestation, birth, and parenting. Through film, installation, and community engagement, this project seeks to bring awareness to the challenges and possibilities of creatively and intentionally building a queer family and create a space for collective reflection on bodies as portals for life, kin building as a necessary act of resistance, and nurturance as a practice of liberation.
This is a long-term project and this is the first iteration of a public exhibition. This iteration is about conception.
With every cycle, something is being conceived.
Creation is creation – a film, a garden, a baby, a family.
Knowing and creating with our bodies is reclamation.
Conception is an act of creativity, of hope, before the path is clear.
schedule
10:00 - 10:50 AM – Workshop: Tune into your cycle
11:00 - 11:50 AM – creative workshop: birth in all its forms
12:30 - 1:15 pm – scenes from the documentary film, turn towards life
1:15 - 2:00 pm – Discussion + closing Song
Art installation open for viewing throughout
Workshop: Tune Into Your Cycle
Join midwives Teryl Stay and Kalli Chason in a workshop exploring the cycles of our bodies. Learn how to use various methods to track your ovulation cycle and tune into the specific patterns and cues of your body. We will celebrate the uniqueness of all of our cycles and reclaim our agency of our own body knowledge and care.
Creative Workshop: Birth In All Its Forms
Join doula Beth Hardy in a workshop honoring all the ways we 'birth' throughout our lives - whether we've birthed a baby, an idea, a project, a relationship, or a piece of art. Through writing prompts, visual art making, movement and conversation, we will explore what it means to let go of what was and birth something new.
Scenes from the documentary film, Turn Towards Life
This feature documentary traces one journey of family building as a queer, nonbinary, solo person. The story follows me through the joys and griefs of conception, gestation, birth, and parenting while navigating a shifting partnership and the complexity of trying to shape a queer family that sustains and cares for all. Throughout my journey, I call on the wisdom of other queer and trans parents, create ceremonies to explore in community, and craft rituals of transformation for myself.
This film is in progress. Several CONCEPTION scenes will be presented at this screening.
The screening will be followed by a discussion with film director, A Madden, their creative team, and local birth workers. The event will end with a closing song.
Art Installation
A display of physical artifacts of the queer family building journey – fertility tracking charts, pregnancy tests, sperm vials, insemination syringes, and a conception altar. Attendees are invited to participate in further creation of the altar.
things to know
Childcare available, provided by Heart Tones Birth Services. Please confirm your childcare needs through the RSVP Link.
ASL INTErpretation and captions provided, please reach out about additional accessibility requests
This event is free to attend, including workshops. If you interested and able to support this project with money, please see more information about donation below.
the TEAM
director
A Madden
A Madden (they/them) is a filmmaker, educator, and facilitator. Their directing and editing work has been exhibited internationally and they have been creating learning and connecting spaces for over a decade. They are rooted in their belief that film is a portal for breaking binaries, creating embodied experience, and a way to see and be seen. Their films, projects, workshops, offerings, and spaces are reflections, openings, and spells, ways to see ourselves, question, and imagine, to hold nuance, complexity, and fluidity, to be in community.
creative producer
Lillie Cummings
Lillie Cummings (they/she) is a queer, Appalachian creative and intentional thought-partner. Passionate about community practices, place-making, and creative expression, they specialize in collaborating with creatives to uplift and accomplish their visions in sustainable, community centered ways. Lillie moved to Salt Lake City in 2021 to serve an AmeriCorps VISTA term as Development Coordinator for a local Creative Reuse Center. Lillie then served as the Program Manager for Spy Hop Productions. Lillie currently works with Future Craft Farm Collective. Lover of vegetarian recipes, yard sales, and art making, you may find them at the local library, a community event, or if they’re lucky, somewhere along the coast.
Doula, workshop facilitator
Beth Hardy (she/her) is a doula and childbirth educator. Her company Heart Tones Birth Services has been serving Utah families for 10+ years, and she has had the honor of supporting hundreds of families during one of the most transformative times of their lives - welcoming a baby. Beth specializes in working with the queer community, helping her clients experience birth in a way that is safe, empowered, respected, and honored.
midwife, workshop facilitator
Hi, I’m Teryl Stay (she/her). With 20 years of birth work experience and six years as a community Midwife (LDEM, CPM), I am passionate about providing compassionate, individualized, and inclusive care. My practice centers on the belief that true healthcare honors the whole person, integrating body, mind, and spirit. I focus on educating individuals about holistic wellness, empowering people to connect deeply with their bodies natural rhythms and cycles to foster lifelong well-being. When I am not supporting clients you can find me expressing my creativity through painting and drawing, hunting for unique treasures while collecting antiques, and enjoying quality time with my animals and three amazing kids.
midwife, workshop facilitator
Hi I’m Kalli Chason, LDEM, CPM (she/they) I have been a birth worker for over a decade and graduated from midwifery school in 2024. I am a mom to three amazing kiddos, all of whom were born at home. It was in the birth of my first kiddo that I realized my passion for not just birth work, but midwifery work. I love how empowering it can be to learn about our bodies, cycles, and how to take care of ourselves and our unique bodies and individual needs.
director of photography
Justis Aderibigbe (he/him) is a Black filmmaker from the commonwealth of Dominica. For five years he has worked as a Director of Photography and Chief Lighting Technician, across many narrative, documentary, and commercial projects with experience across shows like “Wardriver”, “The High School Musical” TV show, and “The Last of Us”. His passion in filmmaking is in the cross section of humanity and the environment, which can be seen in his projects, “From The Marrow”, “Mushroom God”, and “Void Formula”. Justis aims to tell stories that help people understand their own world better, and hopefully themselves.
Story Consultant
Jade Swayne (they/them) is a Black trans/non-binary artist and activist who finds their focus in the healing arts. Utilizing an array of mediums (ranging from poetry, public speaking, guided meditations, writers’ workshops, and beyond), Jade seeks to provide self-knowing experiences for others based on their own internal journeys. Whether it’s self-published zines, handmade chap books, co-facilitated gathers for queer + trans community in Salt Lake city, speeches given on the capitol steps during protest, adapting and performing works of poetry for environmental activism films, or hosting a robustly attended poetry night, Jade’s work is focused on collective healing geared toward a collective return to decolonized emotion-based living.
Cinematographer
Kelsie Moore (she/her) is an Emmy-award winning Australian-American filmmaker based in Utah. In her process as a documentarian, Kelsie facilitates conditions of safety and openness to allow for trusted, authentic expression with those in front and behind the lens. She values leading with soft, collaborative intentions while emphasizing communal care, non-violent communication and spiritual approaches that are rooted in an awareness of body and land. She has been awarded numerous Public Media Journalists Association awards for her films documenting human interest stories in the American West and in 2022 she received a regional Emmy for her directorial debut with PBS, The Gerda That Remains. Working in both commercial and documentary spaces, Kelsie believes her strongest work comes from prioritizing vulnerability, connection and the space to dream.
Associate Producer
Sam Heim (she/her) has worked as an in-house producer for the outdoor industry for five years and is now committed to telling raw, intimate, and vulnerable stories of the complex human condition. Sam has produced two non-fiction shorts: “Meet Me Where I Am” and “Winding Path” and directed and produced the festival-accepted dance film, “September”. Finding joy and calm in the chaotic moments, Sam has a quiet fire to share the truth and beauty of this fragile existence. She is currently associate producer for the feature-length documentary, We Arrive With Fire, about cultural burning on ancestral lands.
SUPPORT THE PROJECT
This is a long-term project with big dreams.
For the documentary film, we plan to continue shooting A’s parenting journey, interviews and scenes with conceiving, pregnant, and parenting folks and birth workers across the country, and more community ceremonies. To do this, we need money for production (travel, crew, gear, etc.). Simultaneously, the film is being edited into several short films as well as a feature. To complete any of these, we need money for a composer, sound designer, colorist, and festival submission costs.
Additionally, we are developing opportunities to produce future exhibitions of the project in locations across the country. These would include more expansive offerings of screenings, workshops, discussions, installation, ceremony, and community participation. Money would support event production, hiring facilitators, installation, venue rentals, travel, event promotion, etc.
Any support is greatly appreciated.
Fiscally sponsored by the Utah Film Center
Recipient of the Assemblage Art Fund.
For donations over $1K, please reach out about a tax-deductible option.