Artists, Writers, Filmmakers Share their Stories
Marilyn Minter · Sharmeen Obaid-Chinoy · Dean Spade · Laura Eason · Intan Paramaditha · Tey Meadow · Sara Ahmed · Ellen Rapoport · Dian Hanson · Kate Mueth on the importance of agency, owning the narrative, and the joy of creation.
JULIE ANDREWS · PAUL SCHRADER · JOHN PATRICK SHANLEY · ETGAR KERET · JOY GORMAN WETTELS · CHAYSE IRVIN · MANUEL BILLETER
Share their Stories
Writer · Philosopher · Independent Scholar
You have all the different languages interplaying with each other. Little scraps of Irish languages and idioms have stories that have been told, but how Ireland actually comes about as an idea, as to where the Irish come from. A lot of these kinds of debates are just placed, you know, in day-to-day conversation, and then they trail off. People start something; they trail off and might come back to it later. That phenomenon of speaking over each other, tales that are known and not known, I always found very interesting. It was literally like a radio that was kept on all day in the kitchen.
You would come in and out, and you would hear certain things, and you'd have to work out the context and the conversation and the speakers. In some way, one of the big personalities in the book is just a radio that’s playing, and some of these conversations are not actually taking place between characters in real-time. They're just snippets that have been overheard on radios.
Filmmakers, Writers & Artists Share their Stories
How do the arts help us understand the world? How do our personal lives influence the art we make? Benoît Delhomme, John Patrick Shanley, Jim Shepard, Anthony White, Laura Eason, Mark Gottlieb & Michael Begler explore their creative process.
Musicians, Writers, Filmmakers & Actors Share Their Stories
How do the arts help us find purpose and meaning? What role do stories play in helping us preserve memories, connect us to each other, and answer life’s big questions? Max Richter, Etgar Keret, Athony Joseph, Claudia Forestieri, Brigitte Muñoz-Liebowitz Johnjoe McFadden, Sheehan Karunatilaka, Catherine Curtin, Kate Mueth explore the importance of creativity and the arts.
Scientists, Writers & Activists Share Solutions
What can we learn from whales, the ways they communicate, and how their life cycle affects whole ecosystems, absorbing carbon and helping cool the planet? How have we contributed to the ecological degradation of the environment? How does language influence perception and our relationship to the more than human world?
Scientists, Activists, Farmers & Filmmakers Speak Out
PETA Founder Ingrid Newkirk, Cave Diver Jill Heinerth, IPCC Lead Author Joëlle Gergis, Director of the European Commission’s DG for Energy Paula Pinho, Co-Founder of The Best Bees Company Noah Wilson-Rich, Ecologist Carl Safina, Founder of The Ocean Agency Richard Vevers, Founding Father of the Circular Economy Walter Stahel, Founder of Advocacy Group F Minus, CEO of Legacy Agripartners Colin Steen, President of Source Global Neil Grimmer
Filmmakers, Musicians & Artists discuss their Creative Process
Where does our intuition come from? How are lifelong creative partnerships formed and what role do friendship and personal connection play? How do our personal lives influence the art we make?
Max Stossel is an Award-winning poet, filmmaker, and speaker, named by Forbes as one of the best storytellers of the year. His Stand-Up Poetry Special Words That Move takes the audience through a variety of different perspectives, inviting us to see the world through different eyes together. Taking on topics like heartbreak, consciousness, social media, politics, the emotional state of our world, and even how dogs probably (most certainly) talk, Max uses rhyme and rhythm to make these topics digestible and playful. Words That Move articulates the deep-seated kernels of truth that we so often struggle to find words for ourselves. Max has performed on five continents, from Lincoln Center in NY to the Hordern Pavilion in Sydney. He is also the Youth and Education Advisor for the Center for Humane Technology, an organization of former tech insiders dedicated to realigning technology with humanity’s best interests.
Booker Prize-winning Author
The Seven Moons of Maali Almeida
Chinaman: The Legend of Pradeep Mathew
So this was the decision to write in the second person. A lot of people ask me: why? There are not many examples of this technique. The reason I opted for that is I was trying to figure out interviewing a ghost. And one of the challenges was: what does a disembodied voice sound like? The narrator's body has been chopped up and chucked in a lake. So, I figured that if anything survives the death of your body, it's perhaps the voice in your head. The voice in my head is in the second person. I don't know about your head or anyone else's head, but in mine, it's the second person.
This episode explores the enduring power of storytelling to shape our world and illuminate the human experience. Writers Neil Gaiman, Ada Limón, Jericho Brown, E.J. Koh, Marge Piercy, and Max Stossel discuss creativity, resilience, and the power of words to heal and bring people together.
Singer-songwriter · Documentary Filmmaker · Founder of The White Feather Foundation
Photographer/Author of Life’s Fragile Moments
I think a lot of joy comes from helping others. One of the things that I've been really focusing on is finding that balance in life, what’s real and what’s true and what makes you happy. How can you help other people feel the same and have a happier life? I think whatever that takes. So if that's charity, if that's photography, if that's documentary, if that's music, and I can do it, then I'm going to do it.
How and when will we transition to a clean energy future? How have wetlands become both crucial carbon sinks and colossal methane emitters in a warming world? What lessons can we learn from non-human animals about living in greater harmony with nature?
Artists, Writers, Visionaries & Educators Share their Stories
How can the arts help us learn to speak the language of the Earth and cultivate our intuitive intelligence? What is the power of mentorship for forging character and creative vision? How can we hold onto our cultural heritage and traditions, while preparing students for the needs of the 21st century?
Have we entered what Earth scientists call a “termination event,” and what can we do to avoid the worst outcomes? How can we look beyond GDP and develop new metrics that balance growth with human flourishing and environmental well-being? How can the 15-minute city model revolutionize urban living, enhance health, and reduce our carbon footprint?
I think as humans, we forget. We are often limited by our own stereotypes, and we don't see that in everyone there's the potential for beauty and love and all these things. And I think The Architecture of Oppression, both parts one and two, are really a reflection of all the community and civil rights work that I've been doing for the same amount of time, really - 25 years. And I wanted to try and mix my day job and my music side, so bringing those two sides of my life together. I wanted to create a platform for black artists, black singers, and poets who I really admire. And it was a no-brainer to give Anthony a call for this second album because I know of his pedigree, and he's much more able to put ideas and thoughts on paper than I would be able to.
I think as humans, we forget. We are often limited by our own stereotypes, and we don't see that in everyone there's the potential for beauty and love and all these things. And I think The Architecture of Oppression, both parts one and two, are really a reflection of all the community and civil rights work that I've been doing for the same amount of time, really - 25 years. And I wanted to try and mix my day job and my music side, so bringing those two sides of my life together. I wanted to create a platform for black artists, black singers, and poets who I really admire. And it was a no-brainer to give Anthony a call for this second album because I know of his pedigree, and he's much more able to put ideas and thoughts on paper than I would be able to.
Founding Director · Center for the Future Mind · Florida Atlantic University
Author of Artificial You: AI and the Future of Your Mind
Fmr. NASA Chair at NASA · Fmr. Distinguished Scholar at US Library of Congress
So it's hard to tell exactly what the dangers are, but that's certainly one thing that we need to track that beings that are vastly intellectually superior to other beings may not respect the weaker beings, given our own past. It's really hard to tell exactly what will happen. The first concern I have is with surveillance capitalism in this country. The constant surveillance of us because the US is a surveillance capitalist economy, and it's the same elsewhere in the world, right? With Facebook and all these social media companies, things have just been going deeply wrong. And so it leads me to worry about how the future is going to play out. These tech companies aren't going to be doing the right thing for humanity. And this gets to my second worry, which is how's all this going to work for humans exactly? It's not clear where humans will even be needed in the future.
Icelandic Writer & Documentary Filmmaker
On Time and Water · The Casket of Time · LoveStar · Not Ok · The Story of the Blue Planet
A letter to the future
Ok is the first Icelandic glacier to lose its status as a glacier.
In the next 200 years all our glaciers are expected to follow the same path.
This monument is to acknowledge that we know
what is happening and what needs to be done.
Only you know if we did it.
If you look at the Himalayas, the frozen glaciers are feeding 1 billion people with milky white water. The real tragedy is if the Himalayan glaciers go the same way as Iceland. In many places in the world, glaciers are very important for agriculture and the basic water supply of people.
Award-winning Memoirist & Poet
The Magical Language of Others · A Lesser Love
I had delayed speech, and I had quite a bit of trouble with speaking. I think I must have been five before I was uttering some of my first words and trying to articulate. Simple communication was very difficult for me and my family, especially in a family where we were speaking several languages. They hoped to instill English. It’s the language of survival. There was a lot of frustration and fear in my relationship to language, and the relationship these languages had to each other, that was something I felt very sensitive to since I was young. Since before I could speak.
