Wednesday, November 1
5:00 - 7:00 pm Welcome Cocktails
Cocktails and mocktails on the Deck of Aurora21
An opportunity to meet and mingle with your retreat group and watch the sun set over the Hudson.
Day 1: Thursday, November 2
9:00 - 10:30 am Breakfast and Morning Pages: An exploration of Julia Cameron’s daily practice
Called “the bedrock of a creative recovery” and “exfoliation for your thoughts,” Morning Pages are three pages of longhand, stream-of-consciousness writing, done first thing in the morning. Written for your eyes only, Morning Pages provoke, clarify, comfort, cajole, prioritize, and synchronize the day at hand. Keepsake notebooks will be provided.
10:30 - 11:00 am Coffee Break
11:00 am - 12:30 pm 5-Sense Mindfulness
People talk about creative practice, but never creative hygiene. The ways we set the stage for inspiration matters. As artist Yumi Sakugawa reminds us: “You are not only creating the art itself, you are also creating the optimal conditions, environments and spaces that allow for art creation to flourish and for you to flourish as well.” We will explore how to tune into our senses and create a customized practice to put you in creative flow. Sound bath included.
12:30 - 1:30 pm Lunch
1:30 - 3:30 pm AI Literacy with Joanna Pena-Bickley
Having a working knowledge of Generative AI will set you apart from other creatives and add new dimension to your ideas. Here are some of the questions this session will answer:
- Which generative AI tools can help develop my hard (Craft) and soft skills (Communications)?
- How can generative AI prompt engineering get me a promotion?
- How can I help my agency use generative AI to increase its value to clients?
- How can generative AI skills help me increase my value and negotiate a more equitable income?
- Which tasks can I delegate to a generative AI tool to enable me to focus on scaling my impact?
3:30 - 4:30 pm Apple Picking
7:00 - 9:00 pm Dinner at the Culinary Institute of America, Hyde Park (optional)
Day 2: Friday, November 3
8:00 - 9:00 am Morning Yoga (optional)
9:00 - 9:30 am Breakfast and Morning Pages
9:30 - 10:45 am Quantum Creative Leaps
Instead of falling into the trap of working harder and faster due to overwhelming tech advances, we’ll introduce innovative visualization techniques to attain dramatic breakthroughs by tapping into our creative superpowers.
This workshop encourages participants to harness their creativity to combine visionary thinking with future-back planning to outline ambitious goals, work backward from a desired future state, and unlock next-level results. Facilitated by Kat in partnership with Chloe Gottlieb, formerly Co-Creative Officer of R/GA and UX Director for Google Workspace and Google Shopping and now founder of leadership coaching and Design consulting company DesignMeCo.
10:45 - 11:00 am Snack Break
11:00 am - 12:00 pm Integral Sound Healing
Few people have realized the self-healing promise of vibration and sound waves to balance mind, body and spirit. Victoria Deiorio is out to change that. She is a theatrical composer and sound designer for theatre and film, a certified Massage Therapist, an essential oils coach, and an Integral Sound Healer. This session will change the way you think about sound, called “the most profound non-chemical medication.”
12:00 - 2:30 pm Field Trip: Birdwatching + Lunch
The ultimate mindfulness practice you can do anywhere, birdwatching instantly hones your powers of observation and leaves you in a state of awe. We will visit the Storm King Art Center and explore their 500 acres. A professional birdwatching guide will help us spot yellow warblers, purple finches, and over 200 other species of birds native to Hudson Valley.
2:30 - 3:30 pm Snack Time + MOVIE Screening: Bad Input
Three short films look at how biases in algorithms and data sets result in unfair practices for communities of color, often without their knowledge. Directed by filmmaker Alice Gu.
3:30 - 5:00 pm Panel Discussion: The New Faces of AI
Meet some exceptional emerging talents in the world of AI. Hear their predictions about how creativity will shift in this new world. This interactive session will give you a chance to ask your burning questions and share your take on what we can all do to make this next frontier accessible and fruitful for us all.
5:00 pm Goodbyes
NOTE: A portion of proceeds from this event will be donated to Designed by Us, a cooperative on a mission to accelerate gender equity in Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts, Math and Design.