Autumn Anglin | She/Her | born 1982
I became “MycoRadicated” in December of 2019 with a small group of dedicated citizen scientists. My passion for fungi is the lens I use to see connections in ecology, society and evaluating my own life.
My career has followed the path of an overgrown labyrinth full of twists and turns that I could not see coming without the help of hindsight. I am a working mixed media artist mostly focusing in ceramic art and photography, for now. I have several degrees, in Business Administration, Marketing, Economics, Graphic Design and Web Design, with short stints in Master’s programs for Applied Economics and History of Energy. I have always loved nature and spent my childhood camping, hiking and road tripping with my family. I have also traveled to the Ukraine, Peru, Mexico and Canada in my teens and twenties.
My partner in life, Andrew (he/him), has been a part of my life since 2003. We met when he was stationed in Mayport, Florida, while in the US Navy and I was a server at a pizza place in Atlantic Beach, Florida. We moved out to Oregon in 2006 and have spent our time here getting to know this amazing temperate rainforest. In 2007 and 2009 we had our two kids and they have shaped our lives as a family ever since. From the minute they were born we have brought them camping, planted gardens, took them hiking and evolved our lifestyle to connect our kids to our planet. In 2016 we bought our dream property, a one acre plot of land with a log cabin home in the bottom of a forested valley. I want to acknowledge that we are on the traditional territory of Kalapuya peoples and who have stewarded this land throughout the generations. We are committed to learning how to be good stewards to this land as well.
I have been an artist all of my life and work in many different mediums. I draw, paint, work in ceramics, sew, weave, embroider, graphic design, digital art, web design and photograph my way through the world. Art has been the way I express myself and big ideas that I can not put into words. As I move through studying Mycology, my art has started to reflect what I have observed in nature. You can find my artwork at www.autumnsteam.com or www.etsy.com/shop/autumnsteam/
I have only recently began calling myself a citizen scientist. The opportunities I have received have been so helpful in encouraging me to pursue working with experts, institutions and other citizen scientists. I began my journey with my study group form the Willamette Valley Mushroom Society, WVMS Funga, and together we joined up with the Fungal Diversity Survey (FunDiS). This citizen science group made it possible for me to have some of my first fungi specimens sequenced, and from that process things have accelerated to finding opportunities to contribute to large studies and send my finds to herbariums. I am in the process of gathering tools to create my own DNA amplification process in my studio.