An Origin Story

—Donna Neuwirth, Wormfarm Co-founder and Executive Director

The creative process is mysterious—a pre-lingual undercurrent most of the time, fed by familiar rhythms, accumulated knowledge, focused attention, pain, chance encounters—a subliminal connection of dots that coalesce into, or suddenly spark something, entirely new.

For more than 26 growing seasons, Wormfarm has invited artists to get dirty, eat well, and make art on a Sauk County farm, not far from this one.

The kitchen window of our farmhouse looks out over 100-plus acres where, for 15 years or so, I watched our neighbor Dale on his old 1930s Ford tractor pulling one implement or another back and forth through regular rotations of hay, corn, and beans.

My favorite was hay. I was mesmerized by the slowly turning yellow wheels of the hay rake (Vermeer, the brand I found out later, shares a name with a 17th century Dutch painter) making neat rows of aromatic alfalfa for his 100-odd dairy cows—the motion recalling the hypnotist in a 1950s TV show who chanted, “You are in my power,” while a spiral filled the screen. I was, and remain, under its spell.

Farming well into his 90s, Dale died several years ago. The land to the west is rented now. Rotations are rare and no longer include hay.

A chance encounter with a documentary film called Trashdance, follows choreographer Allison Orr’s project with sanitation workers and their trucks. Her expansive thinking

about dance as “expert movements” gave me a framework for my fascination with those crooked spinning wheels. A hay rake ballet, I said to myself.

In the years since Sarah Butler first came to our artist residency program in 2020, a dormant concept, opportunity, capacity, wild ambition, and muscular energy aligned. Farmers and neighbors were curious, co-creators were born. Expertise and surprising depth of meaning was revealed. A spell was cast: Hay Rake Ballet—just an idea, a seed—landed in fertile soil. You’re on it now.

Learn more about Hay Rake Ballet