This panel explores the vital role of knowledge sharing and interdisciplinary collaboration among artists, scientists, Indigenous knowledge bearers, and the public  as we confront escalating threats to health of ecosystems and communities on the West Coast. 

The discussion will examine several interconnected themes: the deep history and cultural foundations of Indigenous forest management and traditional fire ecology; how landscape memory and land stewardship practices are expressed in Native American photography; contemporary reinterpretation of historical imagery through Indigenous lens; the use of infrared technology to broadcast fire stress in old-growth forests; and pathways to collective healing following catastrophic wildfires.

Panelists will investigate how public-facing programs—developed through artist and curator partnerships—can educate audiences about the West's fire history while fostering both climate resilience and community healing after major fire events. These educational initiatives serve as bridges between traditional ecological knowledge and contemporary climate action, offering models for preventing further ecological collapse.

This programming emerges from “Roots”, the curatorial research of independent curator Liza Faktor, who has been investigating artistic responses to forest ecosystems. Faktor will moderate the panel discussion.

Elizabeth Logan, Co-director,  Huntington-USC Institute on California & the West, will present the Institute’s signature initiative—West on Fire, a multidisciplinary project aimed at broadening public knowledge of, and discussions about, wildfire in the American West

Adriene Hughes, visual artist, explores he hidden life of Pacific Northwest forests through her innovative mixed-media approach, combining infrared photography, video, and embroidery in her ongoing series Secret Life of Trees, which reveals the unseen connections within Olympic Peninsula ecosystems.

Epiphany Couch, Native American interdisciplinary artist (Puyallup, Yakama), examines the intersection of landscape memory and seasonal transformation on tribal lands throughout Washington State in her powerful work Before the Fire Lit My Dreams

Linde Brady Lehtinen, Photography Curator at The Huntington Library,  will discuss how the institution's photography collection engages with and responds to historical and contemporary environmental themes