World Migratory Bird Day Celebration
🐦 Celebrate World Migratory Bird Day at the Climate Imaginarium!
Join fellow birders for a guided nature walk and a creative writing workshop, followed by artist talks and short film screenings at the Climate Imaginarium. WMBD programming starts at 10am and runs through the afternoon. Check the schedule below for details.
⏰ Schedule
10am: Guided Bird Walk around Governors Island with Kait Walser of the NYC Climate Writers Collective (Meet at LMCC Arts Center by Soissons Landing)
11am: Creative Writing Workshop with Kait Walser, curator of the Climate Imaginarium's 2026 Poetry Lab
12pm: Artist Talks & Film Screenings with light refreshments at the Climate Imaginarium
12:15pm-1pm: Artists & advocates Harriet Harriss & Leslie Ruckman share a short film and reflections on Right to Flight
1:00pm - 1:15pm: Screening of Heather von Rohr's short film and proof-of-concept, A Bird Came Down
1:15pm-2:00pm: Artist & Filmmaker Q&A with Heather von Rohr, Leslie Ruckman, & Harriet Harriss.
After our WMBD programming ends, you're invited to explore our current exhibition Witness to Change: Interpreting Climate Data and to join the next event.
2:00pm-4:00pm: Keep the conversations going about nature and our relationship to it with Nicole Betancourt's Trees/Plant/People/Time: Multimedia Art Installation and Climate Cafe Experience
🦢 Guided Bird Walk & Creative Workshop
Meet outside LMCC Arts Center by Soissons Landing/Manhattan ferry for the birding walk at 10am. All experience levels welcome!
Our walk will end at the Climate Imaginarium, where birders are invited to join a writing workshop. New to Governors Island? Click here for a map.
New York City's ecosystems are home to many species year-round and provide a vital seasonal stopover for migratory birds. With over 150 acres of built and natural landscape, Governors Island offers plenty of resources for aviary visitors. Birds have inspired art and literature for centuries. After our guided birding walk, we'll share notes and get creative with writing exercises and art activities at the Climate Imaginarium.
🦅 Right to Flight: Discussion & Film Screening
Artists Leslie Ruckman and Harriet Harriss will discuss their respective avian art practices and their collaboration on the Right to Flight project. The talk will consider art as a means of making visible—and collectively mourning—the often unseen toll of bird collisions in New York City, and will feature a short film of a choreographic work created by dancer and choreographer Mariko Endo in response to bird collisions. They'll also discuss a new installation, informed by citizen science, which invites New Yorkers to reimagine the city for migratory birds.
🦜 A Bird Came Down: Film Screening
Join us for a film screening by Heather von Rohr. A Bird Came Down is a story of love, pregnancy and birdwatching in the age of climate change starring Mitzi Akaha and Raúl Castillo. It premiered at the Mill Valley Film Festival last year and went on to play at New/Next, the Tacoma Film Festival, The Katra Film Series and other festivals around the country. It is both a standalone short film (about 13 minutes) and a proof-of-concept for a feature film.
🌍 About the Climate Imaginarium
The Climate Imaginarium is a center for climate, community, and culture in New York City. Located on Governors Island, the Climate Imaginarium is activating a cultural destination at the heart of New York City’s burgeoning green economy, where artists, scientists, advocates, and storytellers come together to reimagine and build toward a more resilient future.
Suggested donation is $10 to support our community space at the Climate Imaginarium, but no one will be turned away due to lack of funds.
⛵ Getting to the Climate Imaginarium
For the weekend ferry schedule to Governors Island, please check here. Ferries run every 15 minutes. Take the ferry that’s most convenient for you from either Lower Manhattan (10 South Street), Brooklyn Bridge Park (Pier 6), or Red Hook/Atlantic Basin. Please arrive 15 minutes prior to your ferry departure time with your ticket ready to display.
Ferry tickets must be purchased at the ferry terminal or online. Fares are $5 for a round trip ticket and free for adults over 65, children 12 and under, Climate Imaginarium summer volunteers, and others. All passengers ride free before 11am on weekends. Cars are not permitted.
Governors Island is also accessible from any route via NYC Ferry by transferring at Wall Street/Pier 11. You can find the NYC Ferry schedule here. Tickets on NYC Ferry are $4.50 each way.
Once you get to Governors Island, you will either get out at Soissons Landing (from Manhattan) or Yankee Pier (from Brooklyn). You can use this map of Governors Island to locate Colonels Row. The Climate Imaginarium is in Building 406A, in the middle of Colonels Row, and will have a visible sign outside the doorway. Our address is 406A Comfort Road.