Improvisational theater and games have long been recognized as fun hobbies and entertainment...and for what they teach us about being present and spontaneous. Less is known about the specific principles and practices if improv and how they can transform how we relate to one another in our personal and professional lives.
At IF Humana’s Head of Innovation and long-time improv performer Busy Burr, will explore how being comfortable with being “unprepared” has changed how she lives and works. She will show us how improv basics — such as extreme empathy, exquisite listening and the act of offering and giving — can enable a more curious, creative and rewarding life.
The Age of Disruption with Emily Dreyfuss
Senior Writer at Wired, one of the top ten technology news websites in the world, Emily Dreyfuss discusses how some of the biggest emerging technologies are profoundly influencing and disrupting business, culture, design and science.
The Art of Food as Medicine
Timothy Harlan, M.D. leads Tulane University's unique Center for Culinary Medicine...the nation’s first teaching kitchen at a medical school. The Center provides training and knowledge for medical students in the science and art of culinary medicine. Harlan, a Board-certified internist, is also a recognized chef and author.
Beyond Pain and Horror: Rebuilding a Future
At age 10 William Kellibrew witnessed the murders of his mother and 12-year old brother by his mom's former boyfriend. He was then forced to beg for his life at gunpoint. Throughout his childhood Kellibrew has had to suffer through horrific pain and terror. After ultimately finding his footing Kellibrew began to share his message and become an advocate for issues surrounding violence, trauma, child-abuse…and the profound impacts on individuals and families, as well as recovery and rebuilding. At IdeaFestival you will hear his story.
The Cyberpunk Future is Coming for You
Mathematician, computer scientist, well-known science fiction author and Louisville native Rudy Rucker comes to IdeaFestival 2017 to discuss and explore what our near and longer-term tech future might bring. As a mathematician, a founder of the cyberpunk literary movement and winner of several Philip K. Dick awards for science fiction, Rucker's thoughts on the future are fascinating, thought provoking, fresh…and on-the-whole upbeat.
Field Notes: The Untapped Power of Diversity in a Fractured World
In October 2016 Louisvillian and occasional worker Joe Geoghegan and his high-school friend Noah quit their jobs and began an incredible adventure from Louisville to Antarctica...all by land and sea. Traveling by his wits Geoghegan has explored more than a dozen countries and met with scores of people. This experience has left a variety of intense impressions on him, including how such traveling can help facilitate a better understanding among diverse people in an increasingly fractured world. Geoghegan is interrupting his adventure to return to IdeaFestival from Australia to share his notes, experiences and deep impressions of his travels.
Humans and the Planet: An Unnatural History
Our planet is undergoing disruptive change on a global scale. Patterns involving rising temperatures, changing sea levels, increasingly common extreme weather events and their implications (including public health) may be driving another mass change and extinction of life on Earth. Climate change biologist Scott Hotaling, Ph.D. joins IdeaFestival 2017 to discuss his use of ecological and genomic tools, to better understand how biodiversity is and may be impacted on recent timescales. Whether you live in coastal Florida, the mountains of Tibet or Louisville ramifications of this dramatic change will affect all of us.
Ideas On The Edge
We are delighted to welcome Creative Capital artists Ann Carlson and Ghana ThinkTank to IdeaFestival 2017. Ann Carlson borrows from the disciplines of dance, performance, theater, visual and conceptual art, often dismantling conventional boundaries between artist and subject. Carlson’s work takes the form of solo dance/performance, site-specific projects, ensemble theatrical works and performance/video. The Ghana ThinkTank is a worldwide network of think tanks, founded in 2006 and managed by John Ewing, Carmen Montoya and Christopher Robbins, creating strategies to resolve local problems in the "developed" world. The network began with think tanks from Ghana, Cuba and El Salvador, and has since expanded to include Serbia, Mexico and Ethiopia. In partnership with Creative Capital.
Ann Carlson
Ghana ThinkTank:
John Ewing, Carmen Montoya, Christopher Robbins