Stoopfest Moab Debuts March 6 and 7 With Pop-up Porch Performances

Neighborhood porches, trailer beds and vacant lots across Moab will be stages this weekend as the Moab arts collective ephemeral presents Stoopfest, an inaugural pop-up performance arts festival on March 6 and 7, 2026. All of the pop-up performances on Saturday will be free to attend, while Friday's kick-off event, a solo clown show by performer Meat Bar, is sold out but has a waitlist.

The festival’s Saturday schedule reads like a walking program of short theatrical experiments. At 2:00–2:45 p.m. The Youth Garden Project will present “The Garden,” described as “a soft opera.” At 3:00–3:45 p.m. “The Perch,” billed as a “fable of song and dance,” takes place at 218 E. 300 S. “The Yard,” featuring “plays and poetry,” is set for 4:00–4:45 p.m. at 589 Locust Lane. “Under the Tree,” on themes of “erosion and becoming,” will run 5:00–5:45 p.m. at 611 Bowen. From 6:00–7:00 p.m. the lot on Locust Lane hosts “The Lot,” a “circus-like festival,” and the evening finishes with comedy at 7:00–7:45 p.m. on the Rotary Park basketball courts in a set titled “The Court.”

Organizers have designed Saturday as a neighborhood procession or “stoop crawl” so attendees move from one pop-up to the next along what one report describes as a two-mile loop through town. “I hope that our attendees can lean into the parade aspect,” Sam Van Wetter said, explaining he wants the audience to join the procession, rather than simply watch it. A Saturday morning clowning workshop still had spots and requires RSVP, and ephemeral’s open-call guidance allowed each stoop to host either a series of short pieces or one longer show of about 45 minutes.

Funding and local sponsorship helped make the free Saturday programming possible. Ephemeral received a $5,000 City of Moab RAPTax grant, and supporters named by organizers include Back of Beyond Books, The Synergy Company, and Project Rainbow Utah. The Substack launch noted that support will allow featured performance artists to be funded with budget, cast, crew and technical resources, including musicians, builders and costume closets.

Stoopfest grew from ephemeral’s November 20, 2025 announcement and an open call that ran Nov. 17–Dec. 14 asking for performances between five and 45 minutes. “No markets, no booths, no tickets, no roof! Just weird and wonderful ideas, devised and performed on our stoops,” the collective wrote, and advised followers to “Follow Moabstoopfest on instagram for stoupdates!” A recent build day at the Moab Arts and Recreation Center gave participants a place to prepare costumes and set pieces before popping up across town.

Organizers emphasize the festival’s impermanence as part of its point. “It's commentary on the way that our community changes quickly in both perceptible and imperceptible ways,” Van Wetter said, and one organizer told The Times-Independent, “We’ve got one great auditorium at Star Hall, the high school auditorium is good for high school auditorium things, and then otherwise, it begs invention to figure out where and how to allow people to come together to watch a performance that will only happen once and will only happen in that moment,” he said. Stoopfest invites locals and visitors to walk a two-mile loop through familiar blocks and see Moab as a temporary museum of place.