Past & Present Lessons for Designing a more Sustainable Future

Please join us for a serendipitous journey through art and climate questions. In an active interview-like format, we will bring together three perspectives :

• Lessons from the past
• Current teachings for the future
• Visions from the ground

This event will be moderated by Stéphanie Mareva Failloux (College ’94), with Anna Lea Albright (College ’17) discussing how paintings by 19th century artists like Monet and Turner depict air pollution and the lessons these paintings hold for the future, and Marianne Mensah (HKS ’03)exposing how art helps to disrupt the status quo and open new visions for the future. Contemporary artists will augment these perspectives by sharing their ‘ground-truth’ about climate change and creativity.

Join us, be inspired and share your vision !

Hosts:

Marianne Mensah (HKS ’03) is a founding member of ‘Alive! Art Creativity & Climate Change’. Alive! brings together women and men who develop new artistic and creative projects. inspired by ecology, Their work relate to visual arts, music, poetry, photography, and creative education to address climate change. Marianne is also the Founder of the Climate Innovation Education Lab (CIEL) and a Lecturer on climate change and sustainability in higher education. She focuses on engaging people to become actors of climate mitigation and adaptation. Marianne worked for international development agencies on sustainable projects with a positive climate impact.

Anna Lea Albright (College ’17) finished her PhD in climate physics at Sorbonne University this spring, studying the role of clouds in climate change. In parallel to her scientific work, she works on the intersections between art and science, in particular on what iconic paintings can tell us about past climate change. On the basis of inferred optical properties, she presents evidence on how paintings by Turner and Monet, and other artists accurately represent trends in air pollution associated with 19th century industrialization and how impressionist paintings contain elements of polluted realism. Anna Lea is a board member of the Harvard Club of France since November 2021.

Stephanie Mareva Failloux (College ’94) is a multi-passionate entrepreneur with expertise in Sustainable Finance, Social Innovation, Education, and a strong supporter of Art. Everything she does aims to build a new system, where business, society and planet are aligned. She believes Creativity encourages entrepreneurship, leadership, innovation, and drives ImpACT – “Data rarely move people; great art always does – Art is a powerful agent for change”. Stephanie has been a member of the Harvard Club of France executive committee for 6 years and has been coordinating women initiatives and SIGs.