La Pietra Dialogues– The EU in Focus: What is the EU? Why does it matter?
Mitchell Davis, Creative Director of USA Pavilion at EXPO 2015
They still do world’s fairs? This is the reaction you get when you tell people you are working on a project to create a pavilion the for the U.S. presence at the next world’s fair. And yet Expo Milano is not just a visitor success, with some 20 million visitors expected. It is a global gathering with more than 145 participating countries coming together to address one of the most important issues facing our collective future: how will we feed 9 billion people by 2050 in the midst of climate change, resource depletion, and economic inequality? The process of taking that topic, distilling the American perspective, translating it for a global audience, and still making it fun and interesting enough for the families who come just because it’s a world’s fair will be the topic of this presentation.
Featured Biographies
Mitchell Davis
Creative Director of US Pavilion at EXPO 2015
Mitchell Davis is the Executive Vice President of the James Beard Foundation, a cookbook author, a journalist, and a scholar with a Ph.D. in Food Studies from NYU. With the Beard Foundation for more than 20 years, Davis has created and overseen many of the organization’s initiatives, including the the JBF Annual Food Conference, a national dialogue of thought leaders on sustainability and public health, and the JBF Chefs Boot Camp for Policy and Change. In 2013, Davis led the team that was selected by the U.S. Department of State to create the USA Pavilion at the World Expo Milano 2015, for which he serves as Chief Creative Officer.