Snæfellsnes Peninsula, Iceland on August 12th, 2026. A silence is growing among the crowds.
The true headliner has arrived. People stand in collective near-disbelief, breath held, as the Moon begins to eat the Sun. Daylight dims.
On that day, the eclipse’s shadow will carve a charcoal swath across Iceland’s wild Westfjords and Snæfellsnes Peninsula. In the town of Hellissandur, where the Iceland Eclipse 2026 gathering will take place, totality will occur for 2 minutes and 7 seconds, offering one of Iceland’s longest land-viewable solar eclipses.
Alongside the cosmic spectacle, dozens of artists, tech leaders, and spacefarers from NASA, ESA, SpaceX, Blue Origin, and Virgin Galactic, will share stories of awe, transformation, and exploration among the community of attendees. Supercluster’s Robin Seemangal will be attending along with colleagues and friends from across the spaceflight community.
According to NASA, the 2026 total solar eclipse will also be visible in Greenland, Spain, Russia, and a small area of Portugal, while a partial eclipse will be visible in Europe, Africa, North America, the Atlantic Ocean, Arctic Ocean, and Pacific Ocean
For those beneath its path, a total solar eclipse can be a holistic event that vibrates every cell — human, animal, or insect. Silence crashes over startled onlookers. The temperature plunges. In what seems like a paradoxical moment, we are both humbled by cosmic terror and comforted in a shared experience with neighbors, and maybe even a shared lineage with the ancestral communities that also witnessed these celestial events.
Humanity has named this wonder for millennia: Vikings told of wolves Sköll and Hati chasing Sun and Moon, turning day to darkness until villagers beat drums to scare them away. Halfway across the world, ancient Chinese believed a sky‑dragon swallowed the Sun, and they fired arrows and banged bronze pots in response.
Eclipses are more than celestial alignments. They are metaphysical tectonics, jolting us out of routine and back into cosmic kinship.
Sounds of the Cosmos
Can a music festival be a cosmic gathering? The 2026 eclipse is the headliner, music is its afterglow. Live sets from local legends will reflect the ethereal nature of Iceland itself with performances from electronic luminaries GusGus, Dream Pop trio Vök, anthemic pop act Daði Freyr, and singer-songwriter Ásgeir.
The event will also feature artists who have crafted their music as a reflection of the cosmos: Test Shot Starfish, famous for producing SpaceX’s webcast music; astronaut-turned-melodic electronic producer Dr. Chrispy; Future Dream Pop artist, annu (yours truly); and Tulum legend Eduardo Castillo — all telling the story of space through music.
MEDUZA will bring their underground-infused house to the stage, along with melodic techno pioneer Booka Shade and Detroit Techno evangelists Ryan Crosson and Shaun Reeves.
Converging Communities
With capacity capped at just 3,333, intimacy and strong community engagement will define the event.
Between August 12th and 16th, in totality’s wake, attendees will thread between these core explorations:
Roots attendees in local wisdom and global vision, with programming that features Indigenous leaders and local culture keepers, social justice advocates, and sustainability innovators. Workshops, interactive talks, and collaborative activities will allow engagement with voices shaping regenerative and inclusive futures, such as Iceland's own community legend Kári Viðarsson and global environmental strategist Daniel Blackman.
Invites wonder through space storytelling, cosmology panels, and conversations on the future of space travel. Guests will hear first-hand accounts of journeys to space from astronauts such as NASA’s Dr. Jeanette Epps and Joan Higginbotham, ESA’s Amelie Schoenenwald, SpaceX’s Dr. Sian Proctor, Blue Origin’s Dr. Chris Boshuizen and Sara Sabry, Virgin Galactic's Christopher Huie and Keisha Schahaff.
Opens via guided meditation, consciousness workshops, and responsible conversation around psychedelics — mapping the inner cosmos as the vast sky above recalibrates our inner landscapes. Guests include Artist, Filmmaker, and Futurist Jason Silva, Psychedelic leaders Alex and Alyson Grey, musician and community leader, Eduardo Castillo, and many more.
Communities gather in roundtables on digital‑nomad lifestyles, web3 global infrastructure, the evolution of AI, digital ethics, and emerging trends in the virtual and extended reality space. Hackathons and design labs feature emerging tech, fashion, and folklore — a glimpse at how we’ll live and thrive tomorrow.
Iceland Eclipse 2026 aims to be a gathering built on community and conservation, powered by local collaboration and leave-no-trace principles with support from EarthPercent, the music industry’s environmental foundation co-founded by Brian Eno, which channels a portion of event resources toward climate-positive action. The location's natural beauty is the perfect platform for conversations around preservation.
Iceland's otherworldly beauty is a sight to see in itself.
Ancient lava tunnels, glaciers, mineral-rich geothermal springs, volcanic craters and remote beaches. Iceland almost feels like an analog for experiencing an eclipse on another planet. A perfect platform for storytellers trying to paint a picture of humanity's future.
Along with the Iceland Eclipse Innovation Residency offers a month‑long immersion designed to spark future‑facing work. A cohort of global and local change‑makers — technologists, artists, scientists, writers, and cultural curators — will gather on the Snæfellsnes peninsula. From July 12th to August 11th, 2026, they will exchange expertise, co‑creating art, installations, and activations inspired by Iceland’s dramatic landscape, rich culture, and the transformative experience of a total solar eclipse.
A Pivotal Pause
History shows how eclipse-born awe can shape the human story. In 585 BC, when the Sun vanished in midday sky, warriors on the battlefield between the Lydians and Medes dropped their spears in terror, mistaking celestial mechanics for divine command — and war ended in truce. In 1919, under the shadow cast on West African soil, Arthur Eddington measured the bending of starlight, proving Einstein right and Newton incomplete, shifting the very laws by which humanity understood the cosmos.
And in 2026, we do not stumble into revelation by chance or by fear — we’ll intentionally gather beneath the Moon’s shadow, not just to witness but to harness that experience itself in an effort to shape a brighter future.
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MaryLiz Bender is a lifelong cosmic explorer, weaving space, storytelling, and music into immersive experiences that aim to nurture our sense of connection. She will bring her Cosmic Perspective show to the Iceland Eclipse Festival, alongside workshops on art in space and discussions on consciousness. As annu, she will also perform her Future Dream Pop live set in the land that has most-inspired her ethereal musical works.
Supercluster’s Robin Seemangal will be in attendance for this event along with friends and colleagues from across the global space industry. You can purchase tickets here.