Two International Evenings in Brooklyn

Earth in the Balance: Environmental Activism & Social Change in Brazil & China

Thursday, March 10
6:30 – 8:30 PM
Free of charge. A light meal will be served.
Carroll Gardens, Brooklyn
RSVP to info@brightergreen.org for location and directions

Join us for a conversation with Myanna Lahsen and Zhu Qing, a scholar in Brazil and an activist in China, working from different entry points on climate change, environmental protection, animal agriculture, knowledge politics, and successful strategies for social impact. They will describe their current work and explore avenues for active collaboration spanning Brazil, China, and the U.S.

Myanna Lahsen is Senior Associate Researcher in the Earth System Science Center at the Brazilian Institute for Space Research (INPE). A cultural anthropologist and STS scholar, she studies socio-cultural dynamics related to global environmental change, environmental sustainability, and development, including meat, media, and public attitudes. She serves as advisor to the journal Nature Climate Change.

Zhu Qing is Executive Director of Tianjin Green Collar, a non-profit environmental organization working on water pollution and youth engagement. He completed a six-month internship with IFChina Original Studio, an independent documentary institution founded by Jian Yi (Yale World Fellow and director of Brighter Green’s documentary, What’s For Dinner?). He is a 2016 Harvard SEED Fellow.

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On Art and Animals: A Conversation with Valentina Sonzogni and Janell O’Rourke
Monday, March 21
6:30 – 8:30 PM
Free of charge. A light meal will be served.
Carroll Gardens, Brooklyn
RSVP to info@brightergreen.org for location and directions

How has the animal body—whether whole or in parts—been envisioned in art through the ages and in contemporary culture? How might it be seen in contemporary art, beyond the sensationalism of Damien Hirst or the reductiveness of viral cat memes? Join us as Italian culture and art historian Valentina Sonzogni and Janell O’Rourke, artist and co-founder of ArtAnimalAffect, explore their work imag(in)ing and reflecting on the human–animal relationship in and through the mirror of art.

Valentina Sonzogni has a Ph.D. in the history and theory of architecture and has worked with the Kiesler Foundation in Vienna, the Guggenheim Foundation in New York, and the Castello di Rivoli Museum of Contemporary Art in Turin. With Leonardo Caffo, she is the author of An Art for the Other: The Animal in Philosophy and Art (Lantern Books, 2015). Janell O’Rourke is a Queens, New York–based artist (janellorourke.com) who is a contributor to, and co-editor of, The Art of the Animal: Fourteen Women Artists Explore “The Sexual Politics of Meat”  (Lantern, 2015).