Interspecies Arts Workshop – Attunement
Our first Myco-Maker's Night – a new series dedicated to creatively working with fungi in community led by fellow local myconaut Huan Manton!
Dear Fellow Myconauts,
Next Monday! Huan will be leading us in our first Myco-Maker's Night series – a new series dedicated to creatively working with fungi in community. We invite you to come ready to play and make things together!
Be on the lookout for mushrooms, especially in the mountains! I did extensive surveys for the CA Fungal Diversity Project of the San Bernardino National Forest this past weekend to encounter some real incredible Entolomataceae diversity like this deep blue one here.
We will be taking a break until October 9th as I was just invited this week to travel to New York to give a talk on “Decolonial Learning with Fungi: Organizing & Pedagogy” at the For the Love of Fungi Festival in the Hudson Valley. Come say hi if you happen to be in NY!
Interspecies Arts Workshop – Attunement w/ Huan Manton
Monday, September 18th, 7pm @ Arlington Garden, Pasadena, CA – Free by donation
Join us for an evening of creative exploration into alternate ways of sensing, knowing, and worlding with our more-than-human kin, facilitated by Shanhuan Manton.
What worlds might we make to thrive in together?
About the facilitator:
Shanhuan Manton is a filmmaker focusing on hacking and composting established methods of cinematic storytelling to alchemize extractive methods of production into regenerative rituals, while making real the possibilities of speculative worlds by utilizing collective storytelling as a transformative cultural practice. Their collaborations have woven community globally, ranging from cinematic additions to the Alien franchise, to spontaneous gongfucha tea service at School of the Alternative and various Mycology convergences. In 2023, Shanhuan participated as a fellow in Emergence Magazine’s Seeds of Radical Renewal spiritual ecology leadership program, and facilitated a panel on Interspecies Collaboration and a workshop titled “The Interspecies Artist’s Way” at New Moon Mycology Summit. They are currently cultivating a documentary project about mycoremediation.
The Flowering Wand - Part I
Monday, October 9th, 7pm @ Arlington Garden, Pasadena, CA – Free by donation
[Part I of II]
What does it mean to understand myths as the “fruiting body mushrooms” of underground mycelial mythic systems? Just as fungi taught plants how to root into the soil, so do myths teach us how to root into our ecological and social ecosystems. Mycorrhizal fungi map the relationships in a forest just as myths map the specific relationships of a community rooted in place. Tracking the vegetal gods of the Mediterranean as a case study, Sophie uses modern advances in biology, mycology, and forest ecology to resurrect the forgotten root-system of earth-reverent mythologies suppressed by current paradigms of domination.
Before the discussion, we invite you to:
Read the introduction & Part I: Back to the Roots (Chapters 1-15, pages 1-75)
You can purchase the book from the publisher's website here.
More about the book & author on the Eventbrite link above!
Previously in the Mycoverse…
We had a lovely time with Danielle Stevenson earlier this month celebrating Exploring the Mycoverse’s 2nd year anniversary!
Photo credit: Robyn Beck (thank you for the documentation!!)
Looking sporeward,
Aaron