Hello friends! I have a couple of contributions to the public showcase by the Climate Community of Practice of the Obama Leadership Network for Climate Week NYC from September 18-22 in the beautiful historic #403 building in Governor’s Island, including an exhibit of The Ephemeral Marvels Perfume Store, an olfactory artwork featuring perfumes of scents that are endangered from the climate crisis. This work is nine years old and I am both happy and sad that it remains relevant in these times.

Below is the official invitation via Climate Week NYC by the Obama Foundation, including the public showcase and the invite-only event on September 20:

On September 20 alumni from Obama Foundation leadership programs working on climate issues around the world will come together in a hybrid (in-person and virtual) event during 2023 NYC Climate Week to share their perspectives and experiences on leadership, advocacy, and organizing. Organized by the Obama Leadership Network’s Climate Community of Practice, this event will feature remarks from Obama Foundation leadership, followed by a showcase of diverse climate leaders’ work, then an interactive fishbowl discussion with diverse participants from the public, academia, civil society, the private sector, and philanthropy. Together, participants will learn from each other about how to connect individual and collective efforts to minimize the harms of climate change, including on the most marginalized groups, and work together towards a brighter, more climate-resilient future. Lunch will be provided. 

Before and after this event, a physical Obama Climate Leaders Showcase Exhibition will remain free and open to all members of the general public to visit throughout Climate Week (September 18-22) at historic building #403 on the unique and climate solutions-focused Governor’s Island anytime between 7am-6pm.

In-person event time: 1 – 4 pm ET

Virtual event time: 1:30 – 3 pm ET

Register here.

Image by the Obama Foundation

Hong Hoang, a climate activist from Vietnam and an Obama Foundation scholar, is currently facing unjust detention in Vietnam. You can read more about her case here: https://www.protectclimateactivists.com/freehong/

A movement, #FreeHong, is currently under way, as is the broader movement #FreeHongFreeThemAll, in support of all the other climate activists in unjust detention.

In these times, standing up for climate action carries risk—you and me included. After lots of discussion with Liangyi Chang, my fellow Obama Leader and Asia Managing Director of 350.org who is a friend of Hong’s, I am honoured to design the logo for the movement. Below is an image of a Fire Sunflower (sunflowers being Hong’s favourite flower), showing ‘fire’ petals around an Earth centre.

Here is a black and white version:

After much back and forth with Liang, we resisted the tight, more symmetric design on the left and decided for the final design on the right. A looser, shabbier ‘sunflower’ is a better fit for a design for activists, who work to subvert the rigid, oppressive systems we have today. Note that the fire ‘petals’ don’t actually touch the planet—symbolic of how climate activists worldwide are fighting for climate action to prevent more destructive wildfires and other climate impacts.

Please feel free to download and use for your own activism!

I am happy to be invited by the Education Community of Practice of the Obama Foundation to give a talk for their Expert Workshop series to Obama Foundation alumni on Wednesday, July 12th. I’ll be speaking about how the arts can be a catalyst for various causes, elaborating on creative strategies, fundraising, and human psychology. I’m grateful for the opportunity to contribute to my fellow leaders’ amazing work.

About the talk:

How can the arts contribute to systems change? In this talk and workshop, we delve into creative strategies for organisations to utilise the arts to benefit their causes, from sensory projects to highlight climate issues to workshops to promote education, from activities to scale audience engagement to games that drive expert conversations. How can investing in our imagination become a catalyst for societal transformation? A collective workshop on using these strategies will follow the talk.

While I am in my final PhD months, I am honoured and excited to have been selected for ABC’s Top 5 Arts Media Residency for early career researchers. Five successful applicants in Arts, Science and Humanities will spend two weeks “in residence” at ABC Radio National in Melbourne, working with some of Australia’s best journalists and broadcasters. The ABC TOP 5 is a unique opportunity for talented young researchers to go behind-the-scenes with the ABC’s expert communicators. This is such a great way to cap my PhD journey, and I’m looking forward to communicating about my research to the wider public. Thank you to the jury for a lovely conversation. Congratulations to my fellow Top 5 and see you in a few months!

ABC Top 5 Arts is presented in partnership with the University of Melbourne and the Australia Council for the Arts.

Below is a pdf of the full media release courtesy of the ABC. Also here: https://www.abc.net.au/radio/programs/top5/abc-rn-is-welcoming-australias-best-and-brightest-young-minds/102553870

The munich creative business week (mcbw) is Germany’s largest design event and also international platform for the Bavarian creative and design industries. The mcbw is organized by bayern design, the competence center for knowledge transfer and collaborations around design in Bavaria. It connects topics, disciplines, industries and perspectives. The annual theme of the this year’s mcbw is “Why disruption unleashes creativity” and will take place from May 06-14, 2023. Find out about their events at www.mcbw.de.

Stoked to have been interviewed by the awesome Oliver Herwig for their magazine. You can find the physical version in the events in Munich. Dankeschön!

Citation: Young, Catherine. Interview. By Oliver Herwig. munich creative business week magazine. 2023, 54-57.

The Ephemeral Marvels Perfume Store (2014) is featured on One Earth, Cell Press’ flagship sustainability journal. 

Rising temperatures, sea level rise, superstorms, biodiversity loss, and many other climate impacts endanger the wellbeing of the Earth, which will result in unprecedented damages and losses including many scents and the memories we have of them—the smells of oceans, forests, food, just to name a few. The Ephemeral Marvels Perfume Store (T.E.M.P.S., or “time” in French) is an artist-created perfume line of scents that are threatened due to the climate crisis. These perfumes are created by the artist, Catherine Sarah Young, using chemical distillation and standard perfumery techniques. During exhibitions, visitors are allowed to smell the perfumes. As smell and memory are closely related, viewers are invited to reflect on how potentially losing these scents could affect their lives and hopefully be inspired to preserve them and take action on the climate crisis.

One Earth provides a home for high-quality research and perspectives that significantly advance our ability to better understand and address today’s sustainability challenges. 

Hurray for artwork having a DOI. Cite away: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.oneear.2023.03.009

Download the pdf here.

I’m on the list of 8 artists who are grappling with climate change and imagining a better world by Yale Climate Connections, featuring The Sewer Soaperie, The Weighing of the Heart, and The Ephemeral Marvels Perfume Store. Thanks so much!

Read the article here. Download as a pdf here.

From November 11-14, I was at Orpheus Island (Goolboddi) Research Station to participate in Reef Ecologic’s Reef Restoration and Leadership Workshop. During the four days, we snorkelled the Great Barrier Reef, learned how to make coral nurseries, and engaged with each other’s expertise. I was with marine biologists, rangers, and agritech experts from Queensland and the Torres Strait.

The Great Barrier Reef and the rest of our oceans are a great source of artistic inspiration and needs all of us to care because of increasing climate impacts. I can’t wait for the projects that will come out of me after this.

Thank you to Reef Ecologic’s Adam Smith, Jo Stacey, Nathan Cook and your amazing staff and interns, as well as my fellow participants whose love for the oceans is very inspiring. This was one of the tightest ships I’ve been on and I’ve learned so much in the past few days!