Dairy Arts Center

Science on Screen® Fungal Frequencies | Jan 12
2026-01-12 18:30 - 21:00 (America/Denver) | Boedecker Theater, Walnut Street, Boulder, CO, 80302, United States
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Science on Screen®: Fungal Frequencies launches the Dairy Arts Center’s exploration of fungi as creative collaborators through movement film, and scientific discovery.
This evening brings together artists, scientists, and short film to explore how fungi inspire new forms of artistic expression and ways of seeing. Interdisciplinary artist Iván Daniel Espinosa and mycologists Dr. Alisha Quandt and Mary Childress will offer accessible scientific insight into fungal ecology, evolution, and behavior — and preview of the immersive world of MycoMorphosis: Dancing with Fungi, opening later this month.
The evening concludes with a curated selection of short films from the 2025 Fungi Film Festival, showcasing how filmmakers around the world are translating fungi into poetic, playful, and provocative cinematic forms.
Scientific Lecture & Artist Talk: 6:30 PM; Film Screening: 7:30 PM
This event is FREE for Dairy Arts Center Members as part of the Science on Screen® series

ABOUT THE SPEAKERS
IVÁN-DANIEL ESPINOSA
Iván Daniel Espinosa is a choreographer that creates artwork engaged with mycology, mycelium fungi networks, avant-garde dance, climate change and interspecies performance. His recent multimedia art installations integrating mushroom colonies of diverse species with Japanese Butoh dance, fungal bioacoustics and bio-sonification have been presented at numerous venues such as La Mama Experimental Theatre in NYC, Seattle International Butoh Festival, and Roman Susan Art Foundation in Chicago. Iván-Daniel’s performances involving fungi and mushrooms are highlighted in a chapter-length discussion of his work that was published in a 2024 Routledge monograph titled Choreographing Dirt: Movement, Performance, and Ecology in the Anthropocene. Iván-Daniel is a PhD Candidate in Theatre and Performance Studies at the University of Colorado-Boulder.
On January 23-25, 2026, Iván-Daniel is premiering a new fungi-themed performance at The Dairy Arts Center titled MycoMorphosis: Dancing with Fungi through The Dairy Arts Center’s Co-Production Program.

ALISHA QUANDT, PhD
Dr. Alisha Quandt is a mycologist and Associate Professor in the Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology at the University of Colorado-Boulder. She holds a Ph.D. from the Botany and Plant Pathology Department at Oregon State University. Dr. Quandt’s lab at CU-Boulder studies fungal evolutionary biology — especially the evolution of fungal host and ecological transitions, fungal diversity and how fungi interact with other microorganisms. In 2024, Dr. Quandt was awarded the Constantine J. Alexopoulos Prize for outstanding early career mycologist by the Mycological Society of America and the Young Mycologist Award for North America by the International Mycological Association.

MARY CHILRDESS
Mary Childress is a fourth-year PhD candidate in the Department of Ecology and Evolutionary Biology at the University of Colorado Boulder, working in the Quandt Mycology Lab. Her research interests center on fungal diversity, systematics, and plant pathology. She has described three new species of Pseudogymnoascus from Antarctic soils and is currently studying fungal pathogens of Andean endemic trees for her dissertation.

FILM PROGRAM
Awake: The Dark Night of the Soul (José Antonio Márquez Arroyo Venezuela, 7:00)
Bumps on Sticks (Riitta Ikonen, Ben Kinsley, USA, 3:56)
Caverns and Coprophilia (Hamilton Pevec, USA, 7:32)
Do I Know You, Mushroom? ( Morgaine Lee, Canada, 14:47)
Hyphae (Sarah Muise, Germany, 2:30)
Lavsang: Song of the Lichens (HC Gilje, Norway, 3:30)
Mania (Chia-Hui Lei, Taiwan, 3:52)
Peaks to Prairie: A Holistic Regenerative Approach (Chad Weber, USA, 19:59)
Savior (Zack Bauer, Zoe Larsen, USA, 4:24)
Studies on Entangled Life (Tuane Eggers, Brazil, 16:34)
Where the Mushrooms Grow (Maggie Gercken, Claudia Andrade, USA, 3:16)
Learn more: https://www.fungifilmfest.com/2025
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