Johnson-Kulukundis Family Gallery, Byerly Hall, 8 Garden St., Cambridge
Join the artist and educator Evelyn Rydz for an afternoon of conversation and collective artmaking within the exhibition Water Stories: River Goddesses, Ancestral Rites, and Climate Crisis, on view September 18–December 16, 2023.
The exhibition presents artworks that tell alternative stories of water experience in the context of climate change, while encouraging viewers to appreciate the multivalent meaning of water and their own relationship to it. Rydz has repeatedly observed the increasing impacts on natural and cultural ecosystems throughout her various field...
Gund Hall, Piper Auditorium (48 Quincy St. Cambridge)
Join the Harvard Graduate School of Design for a Sylvester Baxter Lecture featuring Kongjian Yu.
Kongjian Yu, DDes '95, is Professor and founding dean of Peking University College of Architecture and Landscape, and founder and design principal of Turenscape. Yu’s guiding design principles are the appreciation of the ordinary and a deep embrace of nature—even of its potentially destructive aspects, such as flooding. His projects have won numerous international design awards, including 14 ASLA Excellence...
Online or at Arnold Arboretum, 125 Arborway, Boston
Join editor Susan Barba for a mobile landscape reading of her new literary anthology, filled with classic and contemporary poems and essays inspired by wildflowers. What is a mobile landscape reading, you ask? Instead of sitting in a lecture hall, you will meander through the wildflowers of the Arboretum, stopping to hear beautiful poems and prose while surrounded by the wildflowers that inspired them.
Online or at Weld Hill Research Building, 1300 Centre St., Boston
Join poets Jennifer Barber, Deborah Leipziger, and Charles Coe for an afternoon of tree-themed poetry readings and discussion. Each poet will read segments of their works, including the poetry anthology Tree Lines, interspersed with interactive dialogue with the audience. At the end of the event, audience members will be given prompts and encouraged to try their own hands at writing tree-inspired poetry.
Online or at Knafel Center, 10 Garden St., Cambridge
The 2023 Kim and Judy Davis Dean's Lecture in the Arts will feature the Pulitzer Prize- and Grammy Award-winning composer John Luther Adams. Motivated by a deep concern for the state of the earth and the future of humanity, he brings the sense of wonder we experience outdoors into the concert hall with the hope, and belief, that music can do more than politics to change the world.
Harvard Graduate School of Design, Gund Hall, Piper Auditorium (48 Quincy St., Cambridge)
In this talk, Ana María Durán Calisto will discuss the design principles of ancient Amazonian agroecological urban constellations; the ways in which colonialism disrupted (and continues to disrupt) Amazonian patterns of inhabitation and habitat construction; and the visions Amazonian urban history offers to inform our ability to reimagine future urban ecologies.
Join a participatory, in-person read-aloud of excerpts from Richard Powers’ tree-inspired novel The Overstory hosted by the Arnold Arboretum.
The read-aloud will take place on Saturday, January 28, between 1pm and 4pm, within the exhibition of artist Diane Samuels' 160-foot scroll, The Overstory by Richard Powers, which was inspired by and celebrates the Pulitzer-prize winning novel. This is the last chance to see the scroll first-hand before the exhibition closes. View the scroll, listen to the excerpts, maybe read a portion yourself. Samuels herself will be joining...
Harvard Museum of Natural History, 26 Oxford St., Cambridge
Did you know that many of the birds in the Northeastern United States spend the winter in Latin America socializing and eating among tropical trees and flowers? Explore the lives and behaviors of these birds in our Birds of the World gallery and learn about flowers from Guatemala, El Salvador, and Mexico in the Blaschka Glass Flowers gallery. Try some hands-on activities led by Hear Me Out/Escúchame teens, see their newest mini exhibit, decorate a bird or flower mask, and brighten the dark season!
Harvard Graduate School of Design, Gund Hall, Piper Auditorium (48 Quincy St., Cambridge)
In this talk, Ana María Durán Calisto will discuss the design principles of ancient Amazonian agroecological urban constellations; the ways in which colonialism disrupted (and continues to disrupt) Amazonian patterns of inhabitation and habitat construction; and the visions Amazonian urban history offers to inform our ability to reimagine future urban ecologies.
Hemlock Hill and Conifer Collection, Arnold Arboretum, 125 Arborway, Boston
Led by Bengali culture worker Pampi, this audience participatory workshop allows attendees to weave love letters into hand-crafted ceremonial vessels for their loved ones. Vessels will be fashioned out of natural materials sourced from the Arboretum grounds and displayed in the MassQ Ball on July 9.
Hunnewell Building, Arnold Arboretum, 125 Arborway, Jamaica Plain, MA 02130
Join botanical artist, Regina Gardner Milan, in this Nature Journal Workshop. Participants, ages 8-12, will develop observational skills while learning a new awareness of their environment. Seed pods, pine cones, and other plant material will be available for observation and drawing. If weather permits, you will go on a short walk to collect more specimens. Milan will do demonstrations of drawing and documenting important details, and then you will try your own hand at creating a personal nature journal....