‘Fantastic Fungi’ is a movie by Louie Schwartzberg, cinematographer of Qatsi Trilogy by Godfrey Reggio, that I wrote about in June. It is currently available on Netflix.
This weekend the filmmaker of this movie, Louie Schwartzberg, has organized a ‘Fantastic Global Summit. Voices From The Underground’ online. During this event, many of the specialist that we have seen in the movie will talk about various sides of mushrooms. So you can learn how to cook them, heal yourself with them and do many more things. They are all part of the Fungi Community and according to their own words, this summit ‘feeds you, heals you, reveals nature’s mysteries, helps save the planet and unlock the power of mushrooms!’.
Except for the talks, panels and interviews, participants of the summit can also join one of the ‘Mush Rooms’ – virtual rooms for specific subjects, such as: ‘Health and Wellness’, ‘Community Education’, ‘Environment Solutions’, ‘Forage to Table’, ‘Art Fungallery’, ‘Psychedelics Hut’ and ‘Summit Live Events Amphitheater’. Featured topics cover: ‘authors leaders & consciousness’, ‘psychedelics & mental health’, ‘environmentalists & mycologists’, ‘chefs & foragers’, ‘innovators & disrupters’ and artists & visionaries’.
During this event so far we had some cooking demonstrations from such chefs like celebrity chef and restaurateur Spike Mendelsohn or Derek Sarno from Wicked Kitchen. They advertised the ‘Fantastic Fungi Community Cookbook’ that will be soon released, full of helpful recipes and hints on how to cook mushrooms to make them taste delicious and even tasting like meet or seafood, if that is was we wish. There was also a screening of a special version of the film for schools, where psychedelics were excluded but some more educational materials included, to help teachers around the world to tech children about fungi.
The distinctive guests of the summit also discussed the representation of psychedelics experiences in media, healing qualities of art, the dangers of commercialization of psychedelic mushrooms coming with legalizing psilocybin (psychedelic compound of some fungi), similar to challenges faced by the Cannabis industry and transformational power of mushrooms. The first day of the summit was closed by a concert moderated by singer and actress Amber Rubarth, including multi-instrumentalist Rob Garza and Beautiful Chorus among others, as well as such bands as Mother Mother, Dirtwire or Peach Pit.
You can still watch it all online this weekend with a few more events coming on Saturday and Sunday, such as psychedelics in documentary films, using mushrooms in mental and physical healing, including by inspiring art and music, and finishing with the ‘A Voice of Optimism from the Underground: The Future of mushrooms and Mother Earth!’, discussing ‘the way for the future of the Earth / environment and the beauty in us all.’ And on that optimistic note the summit will finish. You can still register online for free and watch it all or buy the Premium Access, that offers extra materials that you can see whenever you have time for it.
There is more and more such events online and they are both educational and inspirational. Let’s take advantage of these offerings.
