A photographic and dance interpretation of the ancient Roman Highway across southern Italy. From Rome to Brindisi on the Adriatic Sea, the dancers add a lively human connection and perspective on important landmarks in Roman history and contemporary Italian culture. 

Combining both artistic photographs of large wading birds and travel recommendations for the best birding sites in Florida and Georgia, this seminar is a must for bird lovers everywhere.

In this seminar, we'll explore the inside world of living things, rocks, and crystals as seen under a microscope. By design, there is science in the art, and art in the science.  Inside, great mysteries arise that are not predicted by the outsides.  “The Cover is not The Book” (from “Mary Poppins Returns”). 

Small, and easily overlooked, mosses play important roles in many of our most interesting habitats. As pioneers on rocks, burned landscapes, bogs, and rotting logs, mosses often provide suitable habitats in which seedlings of other plant species can thrive, including trees and wildflowers. Mosses also can be extraordinarily beautiful, even as they are the most ancient plants in our landscape.  Were mosses the first plants to escape aquatic habitats and occupy the land?

For the first people to arrive, Connecticut was our Greenland. And that was only about 20,000 years ago. The Connecticut landscape had already experienced the volcanic convulsions of plate tectonics, the 200 million year reign of the dinosaurs, and the repeated extinctions of nearly all of its wildlife. This means that, since the retreat of the most recent glaciers beginning about 17,000 years ago, all species here- humans, animals, and plants- are immigrants to a new land, formed in fire and sculpted by ice.

Science depends on a willingness to give up on its most cherished theories. It thrives on the power of evidence to overturn the general assumptions that everyone knows but can't support. But when the challenges are considered heresy, the whole enterprise is in jeopardy. We'll discuss several of the most revolutionary paradigm shifts in the history of science, including Evolution by Natural Selection, The Germ Theory of Disease, The Origin of Life, Plate Tectonics, and Molecular Genetics. We'll also try to identify where the current insurgencies are troubling the authorities now.

From the White Mountains to Baxter State Park, the rugged landscapes of northern New England are certainly thrilling to explore. But in New Hampshire and Maine you will also find that fascinating alpine and wetlands adventures can be had in smaller, more accessible places. The summits of Mt. Kearsarge and Mt. Cardigan in New Hampshire are mostly treeless, allowing for splendid vistas, but they also reveal legacies of a glacial past carved in their rocks. And according to recent census data, Maine’s Rangeley Lakes District has more moose per square foot than any place from away. That’s why the annual moose calling contest is so popular there- not to mention that my brother helps to run it.

Flowering plants are the most recently evolved group in the plant world. Yet they have by far the most diversity. Why? They also engender the most human interest- they are the charismatic lions and tigers of the plant world.  As a result, far too many photographs of flowers have already been made- why should we keep trying? What can we try with flower photography that would be new and exciting?

Since the mid-1970s, photography has achieved a parallel status to painting and sculpture in the world’s great art collections. It has also been exceedingly influential in shaping our understanding of nature and culture. Who were the pioneers? Who are revered for their contributions and why? We’ll consider the portfolios of numerous photographers whose work can inspire us to create or immerse ourselves in this great tradition.  (2 class sessions minimum)