KEYNOTE PRESENTATION – Representation, Reason and Rewilding – November 5, 2022

Saturday, November 5, 2022

12:30-1:20 PM

Crete Hall, Hutchins Street Square, Lodi, CA

Obi Kaufmann, best-selling author of the California Field Atlas, is Saturday’s keynote speaker.  In his artful yet analytical work, Obi explores the transformation of California’s resource landscape, from its ancient origins to its modern challenges and future possibilities.  Heightened with lyrical prose and supported by well-sourced science, Obi demonstrates how we can learn from the deep ecological past to uncover truths about the potential future of California, including the Sandhill Crane and biodiversity in the Central Valley and California’s Delta.  Obi tells the story of how the road through geographic literacy leads to a new era of democratic sustainability, one that we can and will usher in together.

Obi Kaufmann’s field atlases blend science and art to illuminate the multifaceted array of California’s natural world, forming a uniquely elemental narrative based on the shaping forces of earth, air, fire, and water, connecting systems like no other series of books has done before.  For poet, painter, and naturalist Obi Kaufmann, California is a magic network of living systems that connect in a grand quilt of both ecology and beauty, holding enough science, mythology, and language for a hundred field atlases to come.

Obi will be selling and signing his books immediately before and after his talk on Saturday.

An avid conservationist, Obi Kaufmann regularly travels around the state, presenting his work and vision to a variety of groups.  Obi is on the board of Directors of the California Wilderness Coalition and is winner of the 2019 Mark Dubois River Protection Award, presented by Friends of the River.  Notable recent illustration projects include a 2022 residency with the National Wildlife Federation as the illustrator for the Wallis Annenberg Wildlife Crossing in the Santa Monic Mountains National Recreation Area and was the artist for the 2020 Wild and Scenic Film Festival.  Obi collaborates monthly with Greg Sarris to produce the podcast Place and Purpose and he regularly posts his work on Instagram as @coyotethunder.

Published and pending books (californiafieldatlas.com):

1. The California Field Atlas (2017). Winner of the gold medal for significant contribution to publishing by the Commonwealth Club of San Francisco
2. The State of Water; Understanding California’s most precious resource (2019)
3. The Forests of California, a California Field Atlas; Vol 01 — California Lands Trilogy (2020). Nominated for non-fiction book of the year, California Book Awards
4. The Coasts of California, A California Field Atlas; Vol 02 — California Lands Trilogy (2022)
5. The Deserts of California, A California Field Atlas; Vol 03 — California Lands Trilogy (2023)
6. The State of Fire; Where, how and why California burns (2024)