Symposium Overture - Friday, October 31st
Perfect Knowledge of the Ground, and a Discussion of “Soil Health”; Its Meaning in the Urban Setting
Speakers:
Panel: Perfect Knowledge of the Ground
Bridging soil science, agriculture, and art, join us to discuss the roots of the ecological crisis, the colonial extractive episteme, and ways of knowing the ground at odds with this dominant narrative
Featuring
Suzanne Pierre is the director of the Critical Ecology Lab, a nonprofit research lab uncovering the social underpinnings of global ecological change. Suzanne is a terrestrial biogeochemist and forest ecologist, a queer woman of color, first generation American, and proud New Jersey local. She is currently based in Oakland, CA, Ramaytush Ohlone Territory. http://criticalecologylab.org/
Kunal Palawat (they/them) is a research associate with the Critical Ecology Lab and graduate student at the University of Arizona, on occupied Tohono O'odham and Pascua Yaqui Lands. They are a pollution scientist who cares deeply about public health, community science, redistribution of power, and their mini-poodle Tango! http://criticalecologylab.org/
Makalé Cullen: While I’ve worked primarily in human communities documenting occupational and expressive culture, I’ve always paid attention to the multi-species context in which our cultures exist. An attention to landscape and the botanical/agricultural world has long distinguished my work with most of my projects revolving around questions of place and identity. I still work in relationship with people but mostly, nowadays, with plants and soils whose lessons are far worthier of our attention. makale-makale.com
Blain Snipstal is a farmer, agroecologist, and activist. https://www.facebook.com/blackdirtfarmcollective/
RL (Raina) Martens (they/them) is a transdisciplinary artist. Through writing, installation, and ceramic work they dramatize entanglements between social and material worlds. RL is a founding member of the Urban Soils Institute's Art Extension Service and based in Baltimore, MD, on Piscataway land. www.rainamartens.com|
Times: Presentations: 2:15 - 2:55 pm EST, Panel Discussion 2:55 - 3:30 pm EST (New York City)
Panel: Soil Health Issues
Soil Health; Its meaning, context and importance within the urban setting. An introduction by UWI co-founder Dr. Richard Shaw and Dr. Gerd Wessolek & Dr. Jean-Louis Morel, with additions by Dr. Howard Mielke, BeCrop, and representation from Urban farming, Community urban ecology builders, finance, GI-agency sectors.
Featuring
Dr. Gerd Wessolek, Soil scientists and artists do not commonly work together. Their fields are independent and separate from one another. As long as I can remember, I have somehow tried to move between these worlds and disciplines. In my scientific research projects, I try to integrate artistic approaches, specifically fine art painting techniques, to reflect on soil hydraulic theorems and applications in my paintings. By doing so, I try to uncover a deeper motivation for my scientific research, and at the same time motivate others. This hybrid aspect of my work gives me a chance to honor my colleagues’ work on a much more personal level than a footnote or citation in a journal paper would allow. For me, their extraordinary scientific impulses and genial ideas are alive. The vibrancy of their ideas are to be celebrated through a visual language that can be shared as art with the scientific and community.
Over the course of the last ten years I have discovered that other soil scentists have a similar experience. Beyond their scientific work, they participate in exhibitions and artist residencies, take part in films, write poetry, and practice in groups.
My own professional background is soil science, but I also have been painting since I was 12 years old. Painting has always been an important part of my life. Besides my studies in soil physics, I also attented art classes in drawing, painting, print techniques, and art history at the Universities in Braunschweig, Göttingen and Kassel. Participating in a seminar of Josef Beuys on the occasion of the Documenta in Kassel, was an absolute highlight of my time as a university student.
In the 90s, I started combining both in my research and lectures as a soil science professor at the Technische Universität Berlin, Germany. This was more or less accepted because my department is embedded in the faculty of planning, architecture, and environment, in contrast to most soil science departments which are part of agronomy faculties. Within our faculty, disciplines of spatial design come together with disciplines of ecology and urban planning theory, offering space for more experimental ways of approaching the challenges of a changing world.
In our course, I try bridging science and art with new impulses and ideas of you, welcome!
Dr. Jean-Louis Morel, Jean Louis MOREL is professor emeritus in environmental biology at the University of Lorraine (UL). His research interests are i) the dynamics of pollutants in soil-plant systems, ii) the evolution of soils strongly affected by human activities, and iii) the remediation of polluted and degraded soils based on phytoremediation, agromining, and soil restoration. He created and led until 2012 the Laboratoire Sols & Environnement of UL and INRA. He chairs the GISFI, a scientific consortium devoted to understanding the functioning of brownfield sites and the development of soil remediation technologies. He leads the International Joint Lab ECOLAND between Sun Yat-sen University (SYSU), Guangzhou and UL to develop ecosystem services provided by contaminated land, and he is appointed Adjunct Professor at SYSU. He chaired from 2007 to 2015 the SUITMA group (Soils of Urban, Industrial, Traffic, Mining and Military Areas) of the International Union of Soil Science.
https://sites.google.com/site/wgsuitma/home/members/jean-louis-morel
Time: 3:45 - 4:10 pm EST (New York City)
Dr. Daniel Almonacid, holds a BSc degree in clinical biochemistry (U. de Concepción) and a PhD in molecular informatics (U. of Cambridge). Dr. Almonacid has advanced our understanding of basic biological functions and numerous specific diseases, and his discoveries are the basis for a wide variety of consumer, medical and agricultural testing products as well as engineered enzymes.
Dr. Almonacid is a proud father of two kids, drumer, electronic music lover, and the third most prolific inventor in the microbiome field worldwide.
Topic: Soil Microbiome Analysis as a Tool to Assess Soil Health
Time: 4:12 - 4:22 pm EST (New York City)
Donald Parizek, Job Duties: National Cooperative Soil Survey Mapping, Technical Soil Services, Soil Interpretations, Soil Survey Database Management, Wetlands, Ecological Site Descriptions, Soil Science Training
Experience: Soil Survey Activities in: AK, CT, MA, ME, NJ, NH, NY, PR, and RI
Most Remote Location: Sleetmute, AK - population 86 – permafrost soils
Most Urban Location: NYC – population 8.5 Million – anthropogenic soils
Warmest Climate: Camp Santiago, PR – tropical grassland soils
Coolest New Frontier: Jamaica Bay CZSS - subaqueous soils
Education: Bachelor of Science in Agriculture, Soil Science UCONN, 1988
Hobbies: Hunting, Fishing, Camping, Gardening, Beekeeping, Maple Sugaring, Christmas Tree Production, Scouting Volunteer
Topic: Special on Subaqueous Soils
Time: 4:25 - 4:35 pm EST (New York City)
Dr. Howard Mielke is the creator of the Lead Lab project, a not for profit initiative dedicated to helping communities with lead contamination in children's play areas. He is currently a faculty member in Tulane School of Medicine's Pharmacology Department and part of the Environmental Signaling Laboratory research effort.
Topic: Playground soils in New Orleans vs. Oslo, Norway. What happened? Why is it necessary to revitalize urban soils?
Time: 4:37 - 4:47 pm EST (New York City)
Kate Kendall, is an artist working in collaboration with her geologist father Jerry Kendall to consider the intersecting flows of time, sediment, water and humans. Together they have artistically used geoscience tools to produce sculptures, exhibitions, writing, and presentations to raise communal appreciation of the complexities in our world.
Topic: Sand Peels
Time: 4:50 - 5:00 pm EST (New York City)
Sarah Hess is a mother, and her child Josie became exposed to relatively high levels of Pb. She became an advocate for clean soils on a specific playground and that was the beginning of her actions.
Topic: The NOLA Unleaded project in New Orleans
Time: 5:02 - 5:12 pm EST (New York City)
Format
2:00 - 2:10 pm: Introduction
2:15 - 3:30 pm: Perfect Knowledge of the Ground Panel Presentations & Discussion
3:00 - 3:40 pm: Break
3:45 - 4:10 pm: Soil Health Issues Panel Discussion
4:12 - 5:12 pm: Presentations
5:15 - 6 pm: Discussion
6:00 - 6:45 pm: Happy Hour!
All Times Eastern Standard Time (New York City)