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James P. Folsom, the Telleen/Jorgenson Director of the Botanical Gardens at The Huntington, shares insights into a lifetime spent exploring the intersections of botany, art, literature, and history. For more than three decades, Folsom has overseen The Huntington’s extensive botanical collections, showcased in 18 thematic gardens spread over 130 public acres. He has dedicated much of his effort to programming that increases public interest in and understanding of the science, culture, and history of plants and gardens. Earlier this year he was honored by the American Horticultural Society with its Liberty Hyde Bailey Award, the organization’s highest honor.

After a brief presentation, Folsom joins Huntington President Karen R. Lawrence in conversation before taking questions from virtual attendees around the world. This will be one of Folsom’s last public appearances as director of the gardens before he retires at the end of the year. Don’t miss this compelling conversation.

Nicholas Barlow, curatorial assistant at the Hammer Museum, talks with artist Monica Majoli about her part in the exhibition “Made in L.A. 2020: a version.” The program is presented by the Hammer Museum.

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Amy Stanley, professor of history at Northwestern University, introduces the vibrant social and cultural life of early nineteenth-century Japan through the story of an irrepressible woman named Tsuneno, who defied convention to make a life for herself in the big city of Edo (now Tokyo) in the decades before the arrival of Commodore Perry and the fall of the shogunate.

Namwali Serpell, professor of literature at Harvard, author of The Old Drift, and recent recipient of the Arthur C. Clarke award for the best science fiction novel published in the UK discusses the origins of Afrofuturism. This is the Ridge Lecture for Literature.