Art–Sci Fire Conversation: “There’s No Fire Season; It’s Fire Year”

As wildfires grow more frequent, more destructive, and more entwined with human settlements, the boundaries between natural disaster and human infrastructure are dissolving. In this public conversation and lecture, climate scientist Dr. Charles Ichoku and interdisciplinary artist Timothy Nohe explore the new era of fire year, where traditional "fire seasons" could collapse especially in regions that are becoming drier into a continuous, climate-fueled threat.

Dr. Ichoku, Director of the GESTAR-II Consortium and a leading researcher working with NASA on global wildfire emissions, brings a planetary perspective: monitoring and modeling fire dynamics from space and airborne platforms. His work captures fire's massive scales, how it affects the atmosphere, carbon cycles, and climate systems.

Nohe's telematic artwork "Fire Year" revisits the tragic Los Angeles fires of January 2026, a period marked by his daughter's evacuation from UCLA. As an artist, he is committed to communicating the alarming impact humans have on the environment.