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      Open 10 am–noon, Saturday, November 9 (Free admission!) and Noon–5 pm Sunday, November 10.

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      Opening Weekend

      Our Time on Earth

      Sunday, February 18, 2024 from 10 am—5 pm

      Our Time on Earth Opening Weekend

      Know before you go

      In-person event
      Location: Around the museum
      Included with admission

      Events take place on both Saturday and Sunday unless noted.

      Celebrate the opening of the multisensory exhibition Our Time on Earth. Learn about the creation of this ambitious show from visiting curators from London’s Barbican Centre and contribute to a community artwork with Cuban-American climate artist Xavier Cortada. Check out Rare’s interactive pop-up exhibition “Changing the Climate Culture” plus a vibrant student art installation, “The Great Marsh and Climate Change.” Explore efforts underway to address climate change today and reflect on humanity’s power to shape our collective future.

      Pop-Up Exhibition | Changing the Climate Culture (Saturday only)
      10 am–4 pm | Main Atrium

      Explore Rare’s “Changing the Climate Culture” pop-up exhibition. These traveling interactive displays harness behavioral science to guide visitors toward adopting key behaviors related to food choices, energy consumption, transportation and support of the natural world.

      Rare Photo Booth


      Installation | The Great Marsh and Climate Change
      10 am–5 pm | Groups Hub

      Investigate the remarkable living web of the North Shore’s Great Marsh through an art and science project created by River Valley Charter School students with art teacher Lucinda Cathcart, science teacher Rebecca Schwer and silk painting artist Susan Quateman. On view through Friday, February 23.

      Student Panels


      Conversation with the Curators | Our Time On Earth (Saturday only)
      11 am–12 pm | Morse Auditorium
      Same-day tickets required. Tickets at the Admissions and Information desks.

      Join PEM curators and visiting curators from London’s Barbican Centre and FranklinTill for a behind-the-scenes conversation about Our Time On Earth. Ask questions about the artworks and learn how artists, designers and activists are working together to preserve biodiversity and mitigate climate change.


      Participatory Project | Letters to the Future

      10 am–5 pm | Main Atrium

      Write a message to someone living in the future! Based on an ongoing project by artist Xavier Cortada, this activity invites you to imagine the future generations of people and animals who will inherit the planet.

      Participatory Letters


      Drop-In Art Making | Adopt-a-species Upcycling Clothing
      1–3 pm Saturday, 11 am–3 pm Sunday | Create Space Studios

      Bring in a well-worn piece of clothing and give it a new look with a print of artist Xavier Cortada’s animal drawings from the Endangered World Project.

      Loggerhead Sea Turtle


      Drop-In Art Making | Adopt-a-Species Rock Painting
      1–3 pm Saturday, 11 am–3 pm Sunday | Create Space Studios

      Paint a rock with the coordinates of a threatened or endangered species and take it home as a reminder of our commitment to protect life on Earth.

      Adopt a Species Rock Painting


      Our Time on Earth is produced and curated by the Barbican with guest curators FranklinTill and co-produced by Musée de la civilisation, Québec City, Canada. This exhibition is made possible by Carolyn and Peter S. Lynch and The Lynch Foundation. We thank James B. and Mary Lou Hawkes, Chip and Susan Robie, and Timothy T. Hilton as supporters of the Exhibition Innovation Fund. We also recognize the generosity of the East India Marine Associates of the Peabody Essex Museum.

      About our collaborators

      Luke Kemp
      Luke Kemp

      Luke Kemp is currently the Acting Co-Head of Barbican Immersive and a Curator at the Barbican Centre, London. Barbican Immersive has developed some of the most challenging and successful exhibitions in the Barbican Centre's history, launching in the UK and then touring internationally. Kemp’s most recent projects include leading the development and tours of Our Time on Earth and AI: More than Human (2019). Prior to the Barbican, he worked with galleries and organizations across the world to develop programming for the Venice Biennale, the Armory Art Fair and other venues. Kemp has studied at Goldsmiths College and Central St Martins School of Arts, and is currently an AKO Storytelling Fellow at the University of the Arts, London. He is interested in the increasingly entwined relationship between humans and technology and creating content and experiences that help audiences process our rapidly changing world.

      Caroline Till
      Caroline Till

      Caroline Till is a co-founder of FranklinTill, a research agency working with global organizations to explore and implement design and material innovation for positive social and environmental change. Till previously directed the Material Futures course at Central Saint Martins College of Art & Design. Her expertise is rooted in sustainable design practices and design innovation. She is the coauthor of Radical Matter: Rethinking materials for a sustainable future and a guest curator of the exhibition Our Time on Earth..

      Xavier Cortada
      Xavier Cortada

      Xavier Cortada is a Cuban-American artist who engages people in hands-on projects that inspire action around the climate crisis and other social justice issues. Over the last three decades, he has created more than 150 public artworks, installations and collaborative murals across six continents and become the only artist to create work at both of the Earth's poles. Pioneering eco-art in Miami, his community-driven art has catalyzed over 25 acres of ecological restoration, generated participatory projects in every Miami-Dade County public school and library and sparked science-art initiatives to address sea level rise. Cortada received his bachelor’s, master’s and law degrees from the University of Miami, where he currently teaches in the Department of Art and Art History, the School of Law and the Miller School of Medicine’s Department of Pediatrics. He is also Miami-Dade County’s inaugural artist-in-residence. Learn more at www.cortada.com.

      Rare
      Rare

      Rare is an international conservation organization helping people and nature thrive. Through research, education and community outreach, Rare shares actionable changes you and your neighbors can make to help the climate, your health, your budget and your community.

      Other events that may interest you

      February School Vacation Week

      Caring for Creatures and Climate

      Week of February 19, 2024

      DROP-IN ART ACTIVITY

      Earth Vows: Mixed Media Wall Hangings

      Weekends and Mondays | Select dates in February