Eco Chats

Visions2030 invites Los Angeles community members from all walks of life to come together at sites across the city for FREE and inclusive conversation with a focus on sustainability. Eco Chats are opportunities to enhance our creative imaginations envisioning a more positive future for all. Hear from inspiring individuals, participate in consciousness-raising conversations, and dream together about systemic environmental and social change.

Tuesday, May 23, 2023 | 6:30 PM

Crenshaw Dairy Mart

8629 Crenshaw Blvd., Inglewood, CA 90305 

This salon-style conversation will explore how art and spirituality can cultivate social change. Hear from Patrisse Cullors, artist–abolitionist, writer, co-founder of Black Lives Matter, and practitioner of Ifa, and Southern California-based artist noé olivas, who investigates and enacts a meditation on the power of collective care, craft, and healing through collaboration, printmaking, sculpture and performance. In particular, the emphasis will be on changing consciousness around sustainability — focusing on the landmark Abolitionist Pod that the two co-created. The event will be held at Crenshaw Dairy Mart, an artist collective in Inglewood, California, which Cullors and olivas founded, along with alexandre ali reza dorriz. In conversation with Rev. Serene Jones, MDiv, PhD., president of the historic Union Theological Seminary in New York.

Wednesday, May 24, 2023 | 6:30 PM

Latinx with Plants

2208 E Cesar E Chavez Ave., Los Angeles, CA 90033

This salon-style conversation will explore ways that art can not just express but actually in itself be an agent for positive change. Hear from inspiring voices including Pyet DeSpain, Indigenous Storyteller and award winning global chef; Marvella Muro, Director of Artistic Programs and Education at Self Help Graphics, who will discuss soil remediation programs the not-for-profit has championed; and contemporary artist Ruben Ochoa who has worked to empower Los Angeles food vendors. Moderated by Rev. Serene Jones, MDiv, PhD., President of the historic Union Theological Seminary in New York.

Thursday, May 25, 2023 | 6:30 PM

First Congregational Church of Los Angeles

540 S Commonwealth Ave., Los Angeles, CA 90020

This salon-style conversation will focus on reframing environmental racism through innovative solutions-oriented organizing and public policy. Participants include Dolores Huerta, Labor Leader and Civil Rights Activist; Molly Kawahata, Founder, Systemic Impact Strategies and subject of The Scale of Hope, a documentary about climbing and the fight for systemic change; Lauren Bon, an environmental artist from Los Angeles; and Rev. Serene Jones, MDiv, PhD., President of the historic Union Theological Seminary in New York, which hosts an acclaimed Center for Earth Ethics.

Cover Image: Photo of Latinx with Plants, courtesy of Pete Galindo.