Tiny Steps
He crouches hopefully on our back steps. He is waiting for his supper and I, as his regular waitress, do not disappoint. I bend to pet his wiry black whiskers, touch the tip of his tiny pale nose. He visits morning and night, without fail, has his breakfast and supper here, leans against my leg for a bit of a petting, then takes off for parts unknown (unknown to me, at least... he is…
Forests Restored After Fire
My colleague Tonja Chi and I are entering a forest two years after fire. Our work is part of a series of surveys directed by Dr. Chad Hanson to search through forests that rapidly recover after wildfire. The trees towering all around us had been engulfed in the flames of the 2013 Rim Fire, which burned massive areas of Yosemite and Stanislaus National Forests.
The tallest trees are pines and…
Maya Zuckerman
Maya is an emerging media and technology aficionado. She brings a wealth of experience from different media silos: visual effects, film, production, video games, tech startups, product management and brand narratives.
Her passion revolves around mainstream cross-platform media and transformational media as a vehicle in creating change on a global scale.
She is the founder of TransmediaSF -…
gallery one: Syrian Refugee Children’s Photographs
Artist Statement
How do people put together the shattered pieces of a dream when all is broken? How do they plan in a new land under new and unwritten rules with trauma behind them and uncertainty in front of them? In Fall 2014, I taught a series of workshops to Syrian refugee youth in Jordan and Lebanon. Their photographs reveal the great effort that it takes to move forward in life after…
Hildegard Kurt
Hildegard Kurt, PhD, is a German cultural researcher, author, and social sculpture practitioner. Her work focuses on art and sustainability, culture and sustainability, aesthetic education, and intercultural dialogue. She teaches and lectures internationally, lastly as Senior Lecturer in Social Sculpture at the School of Arts at Oxford Brookes University, and has initiated several cultural…
Harmony with Nature
Mr. President, Excellencies, Distinguished Delegates, Ladies and Gentlemen, I am grateful to be able to join today’s fifth dialogue of the General Assembly on “Harmony with Nature” to commemorate International Mother Earth Day as I believe that transformation of our relationship to the Earth is among the greatest challenges and responsibilities of our time.
Bozho. Shaapodaske Gizhgokwe…
Renewal From the Ground of Our Being
The spectacularly successful freedom struggle Gandhi conducted in India had three phases: 1) personal empowerment (shedding fear, for starters), 2) Constructive Programme, where you break your dependence on the oppressive regime, and then 3) direct nonviolent resistance (satyagraha) where still needed.
It was a program for the complete renewal of Indian society, and so it could be for ours.…
Brendan Bannon
Brendan Bannon is a photographer and teacher based between New York and Nairobi, Kenya. Bannon's work has appeared in The New York Times, Christian Science Monitor, The Daily Telegraph, the Independent, the Guardian, Monocle Magazine, KWANI?, and other international publications. His projects have been exhibited internationally at UN headquarters in New York, at Chautauqua Institution's VACI…
Syrian Refugee Children’s Photographs
Artist Statement
How do people put together the shattered pieces of a dream when all is broken? How do they plan in a new land under new and unwritten rules with trauma behind them and uncertainty in front of them? In Fall 2014, I taught a series of workshops to Syrian refugee youth in Jordan and Lebanon. Their photographs reveal the great effort that it takes to move forward in life after…
A New Approach to Stuff
In every episode of the 1970s British children's TV series Bagpuss, a young girl finds a lost and broken object in the village street and leaves it in her shop window for the passing owner to collect. An oddball cast of animal characters inside the shop then repairs the item and imbues it with meaning and value by giving it a history.
It's quaint, cute, and a novel approach to jetsam that in…