Wilder Mountain Dojo · 野山道场
A space to rest. Permission to grow.
Basecamp: To Align with Time that Is Murdering You.
Is it the ticking clock chasing after us, or a way of seeing time we learned from society and now use to measure and discipline ourselves?
A space to receive support, and catch your breath.
Wilder Mountain Dojo is a participatory public art practice initiated by animation and visual artist, community organiser and art educator Youyang Yu. It is also an evolving world of shared practice and play, enriched by its participants. It is for people practising self-support through partings, reunions and upheaval.
I want to create a protected time and space with you: somewhere to slow down, sense the body, express feelings that have not yet found their form, connect with inner strength, and practise receiving and giving support. Like a newly sprouted seed, or a child learning to walk, we can be allowed to explore, be uncertain and grow, rather than be measured as finished products.
An invitation
Basecamp: To Align with Time that Is Murdering You.
Twin Cities, Minnesota · November 2026
Three two-hour adult workshops are planned at three venues, on three Saturday afternoons. Basecamp is supported by the Watson Foundation Enlight Fellowship. Exact dates and venue details will be announced.
This round, I invite you to reimagine your relationship with time, and find alignment with the rhythms of your own life.
When even rest becomes a task.
When instability, the pressure to improve and a heavy workload arrive together, finding time to rest becomes difficult in itself. Even when exhaustion forces us to stop, we may still feel that we should work harder, become more efficient and optimise ourselves into someone good enough. Rest can become the next task to complete.
An alliance across time.
We will enter through stories or dreams. Through body awareness, exploratory drawing and conversation, we will give time a form we can sense, depict and respond to. We will also try imagining the self as a collective continually changing through time, allowing who you are now to form an alliance with yourself at different stages of life: understanding the self who worked so hard in the past, caring for present needs, and leaving some room for the future self.
A rhythm of rest and work can become a promise kept between allies. Practice begins with a small, real action: acknowledging the body’s limits, protecting a little time to rest, or expressing a need. Through listening and responding together, we practise bringing those needs into relationships, exploring how to receive support, offer support and build reciprocity.
Take a card. Leave a little support.
At each workshop, I will invite you to make a practice card of your own. You will take a creation home and leave a card in Wilder Mountain Dojo’s growing shared deck—a contribution for the next person practising self-support through partings, reunions and upheaval.
We hope to begin with a real room and an encounter we care for together: somewhere rest can happen, and inner and collective strength can gradually grow.
So far
A practice taking shape.
One ink self-reflection painting workshop has taken place during Watson’s in-person immersive. Talks and exchanges at the CYC community in Dali are another part of the wider practice. Basecamp is the next invitation to gather.
Where it began
A name drawn from moving landscapes.
In a 2023 invitation to share nomadic narratives, “wild mountains” named the layered landscapes encountered through a life of movement. A dojo was imagined as a place of practice: a rehearsal room for expression, a group for autobiographical creation, and a shared narrative space. Belonging could grow through participation.
First, let a room become real. Then the mountain has room to grow.