Designing for Empathy

Zorana Ivcevic Pringle, PhD, Senior Research Scientist
Director of Creativity and Emotions Lab Yale Center for Emotional Intelligence
Yale University

When we see something creative, we tend to ask how the creators thought of it. Where did the ideas come from? But creativity is full of emotion and empathically understanding these emotions enriches the creative process and makes it more successful. This talk explores how, from the initial decision, to embark on creative work to finding inspiration and overcoming creative blocks.

Zorana Ivcevic Pringle, PhD is a Senior Research Scientist at Yale University and the author of The Creativity Choice. Zorana studies the role of emotion in creativity and well-being. as well as how to use the arts (and art-related institutions) to promote creativity. She has been featured in the Harvard Business Review, New York Times, Education Week, Big Think, US News, Forbes, ArtNet, and contributes to Psychology Today. She speaks at and works with organizations such as Pinterest, Lego, Ogilvy, and others. https://www.zorana-ivcevic-pringle.com/ 

Noël Koehn, PhD, Senior Consultant, Wilkening Consulting

2024 Annual Survey of Museum-Goers data suggests most visitors think of museums as places of connection. Visitors find quiet corners to reflect, encounter objects that spark discussion between strangers, and share simple rituals—like post-visit coffee or conversations on a gallery bench. Learn how, especially in times of uncertainty, museums help people reconnect with themselves and strengthen bonds with others. 

Noël Koehn, PhD has invested her energies into museum research, analysis, and consulting for two decades. Advocating for creative problem solving and resourcefulness, Noël has helped numerous museum leaders focus their storytelling goals, improve outreach, and channel institutional enthusiasm toward marketable, community-relevant interpretive products and programs.

Amelia Winger-Bearskin, Banks Preeminence Chair, Associate Professor Digital Arts and Sciences, Digital Worlds Institute University of Florida

This talk explores the real and imagined roles of artificial intelligence in shaping our collective futures. Drawing from housing justice, climate resilience, and Indigenous systems of care, Amelia Winger-Bearskin examines when AI amplifies harm, when it offers repair, and how art, ethics, and imagination help us decide what AI should truly be good for.

Amelia Winger-Bearskin (Seneca-Cayuga Nation of Oklahoma) is the Banks Endowed Chair of AI and the Arts at UF and founder of the AI Climate Justice Lab. As New America's Housing and AI Fellow (2025-26) and ACLS Digital Justice Seed Grant recipient, she creates Indigenous-led, justice-centered technologies, with her work showcased at Sundance, MoMA, and the Whitney. https://www.studioamelia.com

Dr. Tumí Johnson, Dance Artist, Poet, and Physician

How do we accept and embrace ourselves as being different, going “against the grain” as empathy-workers? How do we nurture self-care even as we work in fostering empathy in others and in community spaces? Tumí shall use dance performance as well as other embodied and science-supported tools practices, to offer an empowered path forward in self-compassion.

Tumí Johnson, MD creates and performs Healing Poemdances, dances that are crafted from her poetry and her experience as a physician, to powerfully instigate and propel the unique healing experience of the viewer. Tumí has performed these dances globally and now works with conscious art spaces that show video of her Healing Poemdances as art exhibitions. https://drtumijohnson.com 

Marta Burnet, PhD, Director, Center for Art and Public Exchange (CAPE), Chief Equity and Inclusion Officer

Step into the world of bats and experience their powerful sense of smell! In this engaging activity, participants will embody a bat mom or baby, using essential oils to "sniff out" their matching family member in a roost full of others. This unique experience offers a fun way to build empathy and understand that a motherly instinct can come in all shapes and sizes. 

Marta Burnet, PhD’s research and academic interests center on the powerful role of empathy in wildlife conservation. Her work explores strategies for cultivating empathy for wildlife within zoos and aquariums, aiming to inspire tangible conservation action and foster a deeper sense of caring. This includes innovative approaches to shifting guest perspectives on under-appreciated animals and leveraging critical anthropomorphism to advance both wildlife empathy and conservation efforts. 

Jim Wharton, PhD, Chief Executive Officer, Connecticut’s Beardsley Zoo

Empathy builds connections through perspective-taking. This session explores how understanding and connecting with animals can enhance human relationships and promote social and environmental well-being. While it may feel easier to empathize with animals, the same neurological pathways apply. We'll discuss how strategies fostering empathy for animals can also help people extend empathy to humans who differ greatly from themselves. 

Jim Wharton, PhD is the Chief Executive Officer at Connecticut's Beardsley Zoo. Prior to this, Dr. Wharton led a team at the Seattle Aquarium that was instrumental in building innovative approaches to fostering empathy to drive conservation outcomes. This multiple award-winning project has transformed how zoos and aquariums engage with the public, influencing both educational content and professional development across the sector. 

Elif Gokcigdem, PhD, Author and Founder, ONE–Organization of Networks for Empathy 
Lizzie Gulick, MFA, Felt Artist

Join us at the threshold of material and meaning as we journey onward and inward from what's visibly physical to the invisible essence of things. This workshop is intended to hold space for heart-to-heart dialogues to emerge through collective journeying, tactile and embodied experiences, storytelling, empathy, encounters with the self, and contemplation.

Elif M. Gokcigdem, PhD is a contemplative designer of empathy-building experiences and spaces that enrich the possibility for humans to deeply connect with their innermost selves and unlock the hidden potential within interconnectedness. Elif developed the Designing for Empathy framework and its Annual Summit, and founded ONE: oneempathynetwork.com. Her upcoming book: Empathy-Building Through Museums (2026, AAM &. Bloomsbury) is intended to be a toolkit for practitioners. 

Lizzie Gulick, MFA studied textile processes at the Penland School in NC, apprenticed in wildcrafting and plant dyeing in NM and taught herself felting based on research and travel to sites of traditional felt making. Her work is informed by humanity's relationship with the Sacred and of how we understand being human. She works with wool, plant dyes and clay. www.lizziegulick.com 

Claire Ongaro, Student
Exhibition and Experience Design Fashion Institute of Technology

Tanishka Samant, Student
Exhibition and Experience Design Fashion Institute of Technology

Zorana Ivcevic Pringle, PhD, Senior Research Scientist
Director of Creativity and Emotions Lab Yale Center for Emotional Intelligence 
Yale University

Jim Wharton, PhD, Chief Executive Officer, Connecticut’s Beardsley Zoo

Marta Burnet, PhD, Director, Center for Art and Public Exchange (CAPE), Chief Equity and Inclusion Officer