Polar Shift 2019 lecture series

ADF’s 2019 lecture series

We live in a time of massive change, of human culture and technology and consequently, of our biosphere. The effects of change are magnified at the poles, at the extreme ends of both ideology and geography.

In our POLAR SHIFT lecture series, we explore the implications of shifting paradigms. How do designers respond to shifts in landscape, institutional thinking, climate and economics? And can designers enact their own shifts in our notions of what is possible, prudent or necessary?

In Alaska, we live at one polar extreme of the rapid changes that are defining a new northern reality. POLAR SHIFT is about expanding our view from melting glaciers to the myriad patterns of human action and reaction that underlie the visual symptoms.

Alaska faces real consequences from global warming. A change in thinking is necessary in terms of the way we manage and respond to changes in Alaska’s vast landscape, with our municipalities and cities, with our farms and our seaways, our infrastructure and our forests.

The POLAR SHIFT lecture series will have Part I (February – April) and Part II (October – December).  Lectures will typically, but not always, follow this pattern: Mondays in Anchorage, Tuesdays in Fairbanks, and Wednesdays in Juneau. Anchorage lectures return to the Anchorage Museum.

Part II – Autumn, 2019

Part I – Spring, 2019

  • David Buckland / Artist / Dorset, England
    February 4-6 (FAI, ANC, JNU)
  • Klein Dytham / Architect / Japan
    March 4-6  (ANC, FAI, JNU)
  • Bryan C. Lee, Jr. / Designer, Design Justice Advocate / New Orleans
    April 8-10  (ANC, FAI, JNU)
  • Stefan Sjöberg / Architect / Sweden
    April  29 – May 1 (ANC, FAI, JNU)

To be announced in summer.