Earth Emergency (Emergenza Terra), the series of public conferences open to all citizens, promoted by the Department of Environment Constructions and Design SUPSI in line with its multidisciplinary vocation and launched in 2021, returns again this year, in partnership with Bobbium from 2024 onwards.
The theme of the 2025 edition, Resistance, resilience, adaptation. Humans, animals and plants put to the test by climate change, will be explored over five evenings between September and December.
The series kicks off with a film screening (Wednesday 17 September, 20:30) to introduce the topic in the company of Stefano Knuchel, director of Locarno Factory. Interviewed in Italian by Clara Caverzasio (science communicator and responsible for the cultural association Trame), Knuchel will introduce three international short films in collaboration with the Locarno Film Festival.
Next up is Sonia I. Seneviratne with The climate emergency and climate extremes: why every year matters (Wednesday 24 September, 18:30, in English with simultaneous translation in Italian). A climatologist, in 2021 she ranked 9th on the list of the 1,000 most influential climate specialists in the world (list compiled by the Reuters news agency).
Next up is Marco Paolini, a prominent figure in the world of art, culture and civil engagement, and one of the leading exponents of narrative theatre. In the conference L’Atlante delle rive: raccontare i fiumi in Italian (The Atlas of the shores: telling the story of banks), he is accompanied by journalist Michela Daghini (RSI Radiotelevisione svizzera), who moderates the meeting (Wednesday 22 October, 18:30). This is followed by the inauguration of La notte (The night) by artist Paolo Maini, who has held exhibitions in Germany, Thessaloniki, New York, Atlanta, Turin, Milan, Parma and Cremona.
Stefano Mancuso is the guest of the fourth event in Italian: La ragione delle piante (The reason of plants) (Wednesday 19 November, 17:00). Founder of plant neurobiology and passionate populariser, he is one of the world’s leading authorities on the study of plants, intelligent and sensitive creatures capable of choosing, learning and remembering. The event is promoted in collaboration with the L’Uomo e il Clima Association and the Trame Association.
Earth Emergency concludes with Valeria Barbi, a naturalist specialising in biodiversity conservation, political scientist, environmental journalist, writer and author of the reportage WANE-We Are Nature Expedition. Her lecture in Italian is entitled Adattamenti. La lotta per la sopravvivenza in un pianeta sempre più caldo (Adaptations. The struggle for survival on an increasingly hot planet) (Wednesday 10 December, 18:30).
Today more than ever, we need a new way of inhabiting the Earth, building houses and cities, and thinking about our relationship with nature.
More details on the events of the 2025 edition of Earth Emergency here.
Free admission upon registration, subject to availability (to register, please consult the specific pages for each event). Aperitif by food designer Agnese Z'graggen with Capichurri.
The conferences are held in the Sala polivalente (ground floor) of the SUPSI Campus in Mendrisio (via Flora Ruchat-Roncati 15). The film evening is scheduled to take place in the square in front of the Campus entrance (in case of bad weather, it will be held in the Multisala Teatro cinema in via Vincenzo Vela 21 in Mendrisio).