Organization putting on this weekend's World Cultural Festival has Boone ties

An international cultural festival in Washington this weekend could bring half a million people to the heart of the nation’s capital, and a retreat center in Boone has been helping to make it happen.

Rachel Bush is leading an outdoor yoga class where participants can take in views of surrounding mountaintops as they stretch into position. 

Bush teaches at the Art of Living Retreat Center, a vast but somewhat hidden complex on the side of a mountain not far off the Blue Ridge Parkway.

Despite the calm nature of the class, things have been busy for staff and volunteers at the center for the last year.

They’re helping coordinate a vast network of volunteers around the country to put on the World Culture Festival in Washington, D.C., this weekend. 

The event is organized by the Art of Living, an educational and humanitarian nonprofit founded by 67-year-old Sri Sri Ravi Shankar, one of the world’s best-known spiritual leaders. It’s a global organization but the Boone retreat center is its largest property in the U.S.

Venkat Srinivasan, director of operations at the Boone Center, says putting on an event that involves a convoy of food trucks and thousands of entertainers is a logistical challenge.

"It’s an event of such big magnitude, and the National Mall is part of the National Park Service that has a lot of rules and regulations around it that need to be strictly followed," he says.

Shankar and the Art of Living organization have hosted three previous such festivals, drawing average crowds of more than 2 million.

This is the first one to be held in the U.S., and Art of Retreat officials in Boone say 450,000 people have registered for tickets, which are free.

Shankar has been touring the country promoting the festival including an appearance on the campus of Wake Forest University over the summer.

In an interview just before speaking, Shankar explained that the festival is a chance to bring people together physically and spiritually.   

“You can feel that we are one human family, uniting people's hearts and mind," he says. "And making life a celebration is the main message.”

His appearance drew a packed crowd to campus. At one point, he led a meditation that lasted more than 20 minutes. 

He says the people he speaks with in America are seeking safety, security, and a happier life.

"We live in now ultra-polarized world," Shankar. "They see that everywhere, not just in America. And then increasing anxiety, and a lot of fear in the people, violence.”

Shankar is known for taking advantage of digital media to spread his message. After speaking, Shankar stood on the steps of the stage where he was surrounded by devoted followers taking selfies with him.

But he’s not been without controversy. Shankar received public pushback when he questioned whether Malala Yousafzai deserved to win the Nobel Prize. And the Art of Living was sued in an environmental court following damage related to its 2016 festival in India. The organization denied the accusations and offered a Delhi Development Authority report to counter the allegations.

At the sprawling 17,000-square-foot space that overlooks the campus in Boone, visitors leave their shoes outside when entering the meditation room of the organization’s retreat center. It draws about 20,000 people a year.

Kelsey Daniels, who is overseeing the event, says in addition to yoga, there’s meditation, spa treatments, and cooking classes at the center.

It’s R&R with a purpose. The focus is Ayurveda, an ancient medical tradition from the Indian subcontinent.

"So what it does is any imbalances you may have in the mind, body, and spirit, it rebalances through herbal supplements, oils, detoxing, and lifestyle choices," Daniels says.

The retreat center is also somewhat of a restoration project. Most of what was here was built by a Transcendental Meditation group. That effort was ultimately abandoned and for a period of about eight years, most of the buildings here sat abandoned. 

Daniels says during that time vandals took over some areas.

"They actually found a handmade or a hand-built skating ramp in the main meditation hall," she says. 

Buyers affiliated with the Art of Living acquired the property in a bidding war in 2011 and began making it into the place it is now.

Operations director Srinivasan says the work that the center has done during his time has helped lay a foundation in the region for the World Culture Festival.

He’s hoping the three-day event will lead to cultural change.

"We may not be agreeing on the same thing, but we can still be together and agree on some common human values of joy, love, compassion, harmony, and really find common ground," he says. 

Srinivasan says the retreat center can currently host up to 600 people at a time. In the next decade, he’d like to see that grow to as many as 2,000.