Pravin Pillay

Prav Pillay is the co-founder of Humanitas Smart Planet Fund, founder of Emergent Performance Consulting, and an artist, researcher, and educator whose creative practice explores how we locate ourselves through the politics of place, culture, and ecology. He has more than 35 years of experience as a social entrepreneur leading, developing and coaching high-performance teams and organizations working on progressive and challenging projects across private, public and not-for-profit sectors. He specializes in Progressive Tech orientation developed over almost 4 decades of involvement in mainframe operations, national data network management, new media and video streaming tech, robotics, AI, SAAS, military-grade surveillance and security, and social tech initiatives.

For several years, Prav was a co-facilitator of Media That Matters - a gathering of media change makers at Hollyhock a leading educational facility on west coast of Canada and more recently served as the Artist and Community Strategist in Residence with R.A.V.E.N. (Respecting Aboriginal Values and Environmental Needs), sessional instructor at Emily Carr University of Art and Design and also an Executive in Residence with VIATEC - a technology incubator in Victoria, BC.

Prav holds a B. Arts and Science from McMaster University, a BFA from Emily Carr University of Art and Design, an MBA from McGill University and an MFA from the University of Saskatchewan. During his MFA, Prav sought to understand the nature of systems based artworks and collaborated with engineers in Human-Computer interaction to conduct art-science experiments that played in the intersection of art, artificial intelligence, and robotics.

3 words to describe Nature?

Truth. Beauty. Goodness 

3 things Nature taught you?

The meaning of Truth

Beauty

Goodness 

3 most treasured Nature spots?

The seasonal waterfall in the temperate rainforest near my island home in the Pacific North West

A particular island in a glacier-fed lake in the Xeni Gwet'in territory of British Columbia, Canada

A particular mountain top in the Sinai Desert

When you look at the ocean, it makes you feel...?

At home

When you see a forest, it makes you feel...?

At home 

When you see a volcano, it makes you feel...?

If active - I am in awe. If dormant - pensive.

When you see a sunrise or sunset, it makes you feel...?

The beingness of the temporal moment in the vastness of time

When you hear thunder, it makes you feel...?

Alive and awake 

When you hear the wind howling, it makes you feel...?

Clean inside

Are you an Ocean, Mountain, Forest, or Desert person?

Each biome is equally compelling. The call is towards deep wild places.

On a scale of 1 to 10, how important is Nature to your well-being?

10 

Share with us a childhood nature memory?

Raising monarch butterfly caterpillars. First collecting the caterpillars and milkweed from under the bleachers of the suburban high school near my home. Then caring for the caterpillars and observing them undergo metamorphosis to chrysalid form and then to butterfly. Finally releasing the butterflies to nature.

 


Richard Titus

RICHARD TITUS was named one of the Wired 100 in 2010. Serial entrepreneur and executive, Richard  has a passion for technology & innovation. His startups include Razorfish, Schematic & Videoplaza. Titus's most recent startup, Prompt.ly, was co-founded in 2013 and sold in 2016 to Breezeworks.

More recently, until February 2017, Richard led customer experience for Samsung Electronics Visual display division globally. While there he led User experience & design globally, and portions of its product planning & new product development functions for Consumer Electronics & Digital Appliance divisions. Richard has been an active blockchain investor & advisor for 5+ years, his most recent ICO’s include Hive and 2030.

Richard previously he held senior leadership roles at the British Broadcasting Corporation (Future Media Controller) where he launched iPlayer and the BBC mobile service and subsequently served as CEO of Associated Northcliffe Digital, the digital holding company of DMGT’s (Daily Mail) digital holding company. He is based in San Francisco, California.

3 words to describe Nature?

Warm (even when cold), Calm, Home

3 things Nature taught you?

Respect for my limitations

Humility around our role on earth

Awe of the complexity, grandeur and ingenuity

3 most treasured Nature spots?

Iceland -  the whole damn thing

Atacama desert, Chile

Yosemite Valley, California - which is magical even now after 10+ visits

When you look at the ocean, it makes you feel...?

Mediative effect of the waves

Longing to escape wherever I am (swim away).

Eagerness to jump on a wave.

When you see a forest, it makes you feel…?

I love the forest for the organic.

The surprise that the bed of pine needles could be so rough, prickly and yet simultaneously soft and welcoming.

When you see a volcano, it makes you feel…?

It’s funny I just saw one in Nicaragua this week. A melding of fear, awe and fascination with the danger & power + warmth of what lies beneath the surface.

When you see a sunrise or sunset, it makes you feel…?

My house is in the hills and faces east. I watch the sunrise every day its part of my meditation routine. I feel a sense of rebirth, beginning, but also quiet contemplation. Happiness. No sunrise has ever made me feel sad.

Sunset, I always feel a mix of sadness about those things left incomplete and relief from the same burden.

When my daughters were younger, I used to wake them up to watch the sunrise. We pretended we could conduct it! "ok over there lets get a little more opacity on the water now. People work with me there’s too much bloody purple.. " that kind of thing. They loved it. They still describe those memories as some of their favorites.

When you hear thunder, it makes you feel...?

Tumultuous Excitement

Expectation

Occasional dread

When my daughters were young, and somewhat afraid of thunder & lightning, I used to lay in their room (high on a hill where we felt on par with the storm) and I would pretend I could “speak storm” - translating the sounds into funny conversation.

When you hear the wind howling, it makes you feel…?

Anxiety. Its the only storm sound I don’t like. Years of danger rock climbing and camping. Wind was something that could cause significant distress.

Are you an Ocean, Mountain, Forest, or Desert person?

Mountain for sure. though ocean gets a strong 2nd mention.

On a scale of 1 to 10, how important is Nature to your well-being?

Nature is where I go to recharge - even nature photos help me center myself.

Share with us a childhood nature memory?

As a child we drove from Orange County CA to  Washington DC across the country. Twice.  I remember being astounded at the diversity of landscape, the way it evolved and iterated. I found the land and nature would reflect themselves in the people. The Stoicism of the montana’ians. The Friendliness of the midwest farmers…