Earth Day

Lichen Pipeline performance

| Amy Youngs

Tuesday, April 22, 2025 Lichen Pipeline

  • 3:30pm – 4:30: Join the Lichen Pipeline, a participatory art performance celebrating lichens as important contributors to our terrestrial ecosystems. Come to the center of the South Oval to collaborate with the Lichen Likers as we braid, tie, and link together to embody a kind of sculptural support system that brings lichen and humans together as “biological infrastructure”.
  • At 4:30pm all participants are invited to line up and join the parade to continue extending the Lichen Pipeline further.
  • Location: Middle of the South Oval. Look for our fabric braids and parade float with tree branches

Earth Day Parade

  • Location: Starts from Ohio State University South Oval, behind the Faculty Club.
  • 4:30pm – 5:30pm: Parade starts from the South Oval. We will walk single file along the blue line, which marks the underground stream of Neil Run. Our procession will continue to follow the historic Neil Run waterway, beyond the Ohio Union, and into the neighborhoods to the East of High Street, to end at Iuka Ravine – where the water that once flowed there has left an enduring mark on the land.

Lichen Likers join Earth Day 2025

| clemente.49

Every day is Earth Day, but April 22 is when we celebrate.

It is the 55th Anniversary of Earth Day – let’s celebrate! You are cordially invited to the Living Art and Ecology Lab’s 2025 Earth Day Events and Parade.

What: We are having a parade and participatory performance on campus in honor of Earth Day and invite you to join us! Together with various classes, student organizations, and partners from across campus, the parade is composed of costumes, banners, and floats dedicated to the soil, air, and waters upon which we all depend for our shared existence. This event is a celebration of joy for everything that makes life on this floating blue marble possible!

When: April 22nd, 2025. 3:30pm Participatory Performance. 4:30 Parade starts See the Full Schedule of Events

Where: Meet on the South Oval. Parade goes from the East end of Mirror Lake and moving towards Iuka Ravine.

How: For a simple way to join, show up on the South Oval wearing blue, green, or brown to represent the water, soil, lichen, or plants of the Earth. Costumes relating to the spirit of the event are also encouraged. You can also become part of the Lichen Pipeline participatory performance by arriving at 3:30 to don an artistic costumes provided by the Lichen Likers.

Who: Current collaborators in this celebration include the Living Art & Ecology Lab, the Lichen Learning group, known as the Lichen Likers and Lost Waters research group; SUSTAINs Living Community; Facilities, Operations, and Development; Planning, Architecture, and Real Estate, The Emerging Technology Studio; Knowlton School of Architecture; The Soil Culture Group; Art 5101 Eco Art Class; Art 3001 and 4503 Glass Classes; Design 4650 Collaborative Design Studio

See the Full Schedule of Events

Fungal Entanglement: a lichen journey

| Amy Youngs

The Lichen Likers art research group spent the last year studying lichen and practicing creative methods for spreading and sporulating this knowledge. We are learning with lichens and drawing inspiration from their symbiotic lifestyles (a non-binary association of fungi and photosynthetic partners).

Symbiosis, interdependence, hospitality, and caring about our non-human kin were the key concepts for this Fungal Entanglement performance. We practiced audience participation, group movements, and focusing attention on the presence and lifestyles of lichen. The fabric sculpture represents fungi and the way that it grows flexible, symbiotic networks that enable mutually beneficial exchanges with plants and other species.

Fungal Entanglement artists: Anna Arbogast, Madison Blue, Alex Buchan, Xiuer Gu, Elias Marquez, Jiara Sha, Doo-sung Yoo, and Amy Youngs.

Photography: Dev Patel and Amy Youngs

See video documentation