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Four Lavin Speakers Featured on Prospect Magazine’s Best Books of 2019 Lists

Shoshana Zuboff, Jared Diamond, David Wallace-Wells, and Naomi Klein are undoubtedly some of the most interesting thinkers of our time—and Prospect recently named their newest books to their prestigious Best of 2019 series.

Shoshana Zuboff’s groundbreaking The Age of Surveillance Capitalism—called “an epoch-defining international bestseller” by Guardian—is also one of Prospect’s picks for the Best Books of Bold Ideas. And it’s no wonder— it’s already named one of TIME’s 100 Must-Read Books of 2019 and one of Bloomberg’s Best Books of 2019. Zuboff created the new term—surveillance capitalism—to describe our current era where private data has a price, and we’ve fallen behind on protecting ourselves from the corporations that aim to control our spending and social habits. The Age of Surveillance Capitalism is a fascinating, frightening, and powerful read. Zuboff urges leaders to pay attention, compels citizens to resist habituation, and explores how together, we can come up with innovative responses to an invasive new era. 

 

Pulitzer Prize winning author Jared Diamond’s newest book, Upheaval, explores why some nations fail and others recover in the face of conflict. Connecting coping mechanisms more commonly associated with personal trauma to show how successful nations recover from crisis; his work offers a refreshing take on some of the most profound evolutionary questions of our time. Also on Prospect’s picks for Best Books of Bold Ideas, Diamond’s work explores how we can improve modern society from looking to the past, and interrogates the collective strides necessary to do so—before it’s too late.

 

Making their list of Best Science Books of 2019 is The Uninhabitable Earth, by David Wallace-Wells. A sweeping, vibrant, and alarming look at “what will the world actually look like” in the not-so-distant future. Already hailed in year-end acknowledgements by the likes the New York TimesGQ, and TIME, Wallace-Wells’ work made waves around the globe this year: pulling no punches and exploring the existential fear of environmental collapse in addition to its very real inevitability if we resist large-scale socioeconomic reform.

 

Also featured on Prospect’s year-end round up of notable science titles is the most recent offering from award-winning journalist and best-selling author Naomi Klein, On Fire. Her eye-opening writing on acute environmental decline exposes not only our past misdeeds, but our current failings leading to an unsustainable, unstable world. But it’s not all doom and gloom—Klein also explores compelling practical solutions and the fundamental realignment of the economy needed to ensure we have any future at all.

 

To book speakers Jared Diamond, Shoshana Zuboff, David Wallace-Wells, and Naomi Klein, contact The Lavin Agency, their exclusive speakers bureau.

The Anthropocene Project, Featuring the Acclaimed Photography of Edward Burtynsky, Launches New VR App

The Anthropocene Project—the cumulative work of a years-long exploration of humanity’s impact on the world—is embracing the future with a new VR app. A multidisciplinary endeavor combining a feature documentary (directed by Edward Burtynsky, Jennifer Baichwal, and Nicholas de Pencier), art photography, scientific research, and now VR, The Anthropocene Project engages viewers with its in-depth inquiry into the human influence on the future of our planet. 

Now, three of the project’s short documentaries are linked up with VR apps, so curious minds can immerse themselves in a captivating narrative full of Edward Burtynsky’s staggering visuals in a full 360° experience. The three original films featured are Ivory Burn (capturing the largest ivory burn in history and its symbolic message to illegal trade syndicates, while bearing witness to the loss of the diversity of animal life it embodied); Dandora (exploring the largest landfill in Kenya and the microeconomy—and massive geological change—it enables); and Carrara (following the ecological impact of the global export economy of precious marble).

 

Burtynsky’s remarkable photographic depictions of global industrial landscapes are included in the collections of over fifty major museums around the world, including the Museum of Modern Art in New York. His exhibitions, which have all been published as books, include Manufactured LandscapesBefore the FloodChinaOil, and Water. Burtynsky’s photos explore the complicated link between industry and nature, resulting in incredibly evocative visuals that find beauty and humanity even amid destruction. 

 

He has spoken at the Library of Congress, was one of the first recipients of the TED Prize, and is also an Officer of the Order of Canada.  He has been named one of named one of Canada’s Greatest Explorers by Canadian Geographic, and, in November 2019, The Royal Canadian Geographical Society presented him with the Gold Medal for his work in environmental photography.

 

The Anthropocene Project’s VR app is now available on Apple, Google Play, and Viveport; coming soon to Oculus Rift, Gear VR, and Go. Alternately, you can explore the films in 360° via the links here.

 

To book speaker Edward Burtynsky, contact his exclusive speakers bureau, The Lavin Agency.

Edward Burtynsky Premieres New Documentary ANTHROPOCENE: The Human Epoch

Four years in the making, ANTHROPOCENE: The Human Epoch is a feature documentary from the award-winning team of Edward Burtynsky, Jennifer Baichwal, and Nicholas de Pencier. It’s a masterful meditation on humanity’s massive reshaping of the planet, and debuts in over 100 theaters in the US alone, to coincide with the UN Climate Action Summit.

ANTHROPOCENE follows the research of the Anthropocene Working Group, an international body of scientists who’ve studied the profoundly impactful changes humans have made to the Earth. It’s the third in an award-winning trilogy where Burtynsky’s life and work is explored. Traveling the globe, Burtynsky and his collaborators document the damning evidence that we are, indeed, in the anthropocene: the geological epoch wherein humans are the main cause of permanent planetary change.

 

Exploring the intersection of art and science, Burtynsky’s work has always been remarkable; depicting global industrial landscapes and capturing critical moments in geological history so provocatively that his images have been included in the collections of over fifty major museums around the world—including the Museum of Modern Art in New York. He’s spoken at the Library of Congress, is one of the first recipients of the TED Prize, and has been named an Officer of the Order of Canada.

To book speaker Edward Burtynsky, contact his exclusive speakers bureau, The Lavin Agency.

 

Naomi Klein’s New Book On Fire Hits Shelves Just in Time for #ClimateStrike

As students, workers, and people from all walks of life around the world are striking in the name of climate reform, bestselling author and renowned journalist Naomi Klein has released a hot new title—On Fire: The (Burning) Case for a New Green Deal.

A longtime prominent figure calling for international attention to the climate crisis, Klein once again thoroughly lays out exactly where we stand in terms of the environment—and exactly how fast we’re sinking into the irreversible, devastating consequences of our actions—and lack thereof.

 

A true force of nature herself, Klein is beloved by climate activists seasoned and blossoming alike: hailed as the “intellectual godmother of the Green New Deal,” by 350.org founder Bill McKibben, and as the “great chronicler of our age of climate emergency, an inspirer of generations,” by Greta Thunberg, her powerful influence has had a ripple effect on an international level. 

 

In On Fire, Klein writes with renewed urgency from the frontlines of modern natural disaster; issuing prescient warnings and illustrating that the fight for a greener planet is one and the same with a fight for our lives—and social justice. Reflecting her burning prose and call to action is the fiery passion of protesters worldwide hoping to catalyze real change; to inject the impetus to enact a New Green Deal now—lest we incinerate instead. Although never without hopeful glimpses to a better future, Klein has never slowed down in her fight—because climate change isn’t slowing down either.

New Speaker Michael Green Has a Solution to Housing Shortages—And It’s Sustainable

With the climate crisis rapidly snowballing, how can we afford to house the 3 billion people who will need homes in the next twenty years? For sustainable architect Michael Green, the answer is building with wood.

Almost half of our energy use and greenhouse gas emissions are related to the building industry. The materials of the last centuryconcrete and steelaccount for 8% of global emissions. By looking to nature, award-winning architect and new Lavin speaker Michael Green explains how we can solve two problemsworld housing and climate changein an innovative, systemic way. He advocates for sweeping changes in building regulations to embrace wood as a building material for large-scale projects—even 30 foot tall skyscrapers (otherwise known as “plyscrapers”). “I believe that wood is the most technologically advanced material I can build with,” Green explains. “It just happens to be that Mother Nature holds the patent, and we don't really feel comfortable with it.”

 

Green authored the book The Case for Tall Wood Buildings. His company, Michael Green Architecture, was recently acquired by Silicon Valley construction start-up Katerra, a move that Green says will help “advance our agenda on design, quality, sustainability, and affordability.”
 

Michael Green: Why we should build wooden skyscrapers

 

To book Michael Green or another Environment speaker for your next event, contact The Lavin Agency today.