Garden States: Regeneration - Second Program Announcement
BLOOMING GOOD NEWS – ANNOUNCING OUR INCREDIBLE SECOND ROUND OF KEYNOTE SPEAKERS!
With spring on the horizon and the scent of eucalyptus in the air, maybe many of you are feeling the call to camp as a community later in the year. With all this in mind, we’re thrilled to share our second program announcement for Garden States: Regeneration, EGA’s much-anticipated return to the great outdoors.
Kathleen Harrison is an esteemed ethnobotanist, educator, and founder of Botanical Dimensions—a nonprofit she co-founded with her former husband, Terence McKenna—renowned for her decades of fieldwork exploring the cultural and spiritual relationships between plants, fungi, and traditional knowledge systems. Few women in the ethnobotany community are as revered as Kathleen Harrison. She’ll be delivering two keynote presentations at this rare public appearance outside the U.S. — and at this intimate gathering, you might even have the chance for a personal conversation.
Part anthropologist, part cultural cartographer, Graham St John tracks the mythologies, movements, and misfits shaping psychedelic and festival culture, most recently through his deep-dive biography of Terence McKenna. Graham will deliver two lectures on McKenna’s life, including Terence McKenna’s Australian Adventure, which revisits McKenna’s surreal 1997 tour Down Under and his role as psychedelic provocateur, novelty theorist, and cult icon at the edge of time.
Few people know their fungi like Alison Pouliot, an ecologist and photographer whose work blends science and sensuality, inviting us to fall in love with the forest floor all over again. In her talk Recalibrating Fungi – Bringing Mushrooms Back to Earth, Alison will explore how ethnomycological knowledge and cultural traditions can help counter persistent myths and sensationalism surrounding fungi.
Researcher, educator, and land steward Neil Logan brings decades of experience with medicinal and entheogenic plants, combining traditional ecological knowledge with modern agroforestry to support regeneration and reciprocity. At EGA 2025, he’ll present The Yagé Complex: Vines Used in the Ayahuasca Brew, an exploration of the taxonomy, cultural history, and ecological context of Banisteriopsis caapi and its lookalikes—offering insight into one of the world’s most significant sacred plant traditions.
Cetacean whisperer, permaculture builder, and lifelong psychonaut, Scott Taylor has spent decades bridging worlds—between humans and dolphins, science and spirit, inner work and ecological action. At EGA 2025, Scott will deliver two interwoven talks, including Altered Spaces: A Psychedelic History and Light Shows—a vivid, autobiographical journey through the early psychedelic movement in the US, exploring community, consciousness, and the art of light as spiritual expression, all framed by the wild, liminal decades that shaped a life lived on the edge of cultural evolution.
From co-inventing 3D web tech to teaching alongside Terence McKenna and the Shulgins, futurist Mark Pesce has been helping us decode the weirdness of the now (and the next) for over forty years. At Garden states: Regeneration 2025, Mark will present And Now For Something Completely Human — a powerful call to rethink ageing and embrace longevity as a chance to deepen connection, contribution, and vitality. Drawing on science, spirit, and lived experience, this talk explores how we can expand our ‘healthspan’ to match our lifespan — and reimagine eldership as an active, purposeful, and humanising force for ourselves and our communities.
MORE PRESENTATIONS AND WORKSHOPS THAT MADE THE GRADE – SECOND PROGRAM ANNOUNCEMENT!
With a sharp pen and a keen eye for power dynamics, PhD candidate Kayla Greenstien is part of a new wave of psychedelic thinkers unafraid to ask difficult questions about healing, consent, and who gets to lead. At Garden states: Regeneration 2025 she’ll present A Critical Feminist Perspective on Historic and Contemporary Clinical Psychedelic Use in Australia, a critical examination of how gendered frameworks and unexamined spiritual models shaped clinical practice from the 1960s onward—and why those legacies still matter today
After three decades working with edible fungi across Iran and Australia, Mohammed Reza Mirzadeh has recently turned his attention to the psychedelic realm. At Garden states: Regeneration 2025, he’ll present Determination of Psychoactive Alkaloids in Psilocybe subaeruginosa of Victoria by HPLC-PDA, sharing new research that quantifies psilocybin, psilocin, and related tryptamines in locally grown mushrooms using advanced analytical techniques.
Image by Jonathan Carmichael
Part drug law advocate, part plant geek, Torsten Wiedemann has long been a quiet force behind Australia’s ethnobotanical movement. At EGA 2025, he teams up with Sianna-Rose ‘Pixie’ Miller for Solanaceae: Mystery and Wonder — a hands-on workshop exploring the potent and perplexing world of Solanaceae plants. From Datura to Duboisia, the session covers cultural histories, pharmacology, cultivation, and risks, finishing with a rare chance to taste honey from Australia’s Duboisia fields.
From the Amazon to Melbourne Uni, Adrienne Mitchell’s journey with entheogens blends lived experience, academic rigour, and deep respect for the plants that shaped her path. At EGA 2025, she’ll lead The Theory and Method of Propagating Banisteriopsis caapi from Cutting— a hands-on workshop teaching practical techniques for cultivating the sacred vine behind ayahuasca. Perfect for growers at any level.
Ethnobotanist Jessica Moulynox is helping bring native edibles and medicines back into everyday life. At EGA 2025, she’ll lead Introduction to Ethnobotany: Connecting to Nature Through Native Edible and Medicinal Plants — a hands-on workshop combining storytelling, sensory learning, and practical tips for recognising and using local species to build a deeper connection with Country.
