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Science Night Out

Science on Screen Presents: Shelf Life

Four shelves have hundreds of samples of cheese and a graphic says Texas Science Festival 2025

Feb

21

2025

7:00 pm – 9:00 pm
In Person (view details)
Featured Speaker(s): Ian Cheney, Anna Finger, Karen Fingerman, and John Antonelli
Cost: $13.50 ($5 discount with code TSF25)
The Austin Film Society will host a special ticketed screening of “Shelf Life,” a global exploration of cheesemaking in unexpected places that draws surprising parallels between the aging of cheese and the human experience.
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Description

Might spending time among people who age cheese yield insights about what it is like for us humans to grow old? Enjoy a sensory and philosophical journey into time, decay and craftsmanship and an evening of film and science at this special event. 

Watch a film that is a worldwide “Mondo Cheese” with the world’s many cheese-making and cheese-enjoying traditions as the subject matter. For this very special Science On Screen® and Texas Science Festival event, the film “Shelf Life” from director Ian Cheney will be screened. Following the film a panel of experts including John Antonelli of Antonelli’s Cheese and past president of the American Cheese Society, Ian Cheney and aging experts Karen Fingerman and Anna Hardy Finger from The University of Texas at Austin will discuss the many scientific aspects of this much-appreciated culinary discipline.

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Schedule:

  • 6:15 p.m. Antonelli’s Cheese tastings
  • 7:00 p.m. Shelf Life Screening
  • 8:30 p.m. Panel discussion

Arrive early for complimentary cheese tastings from Antonelli’s Cheese.

Science on Screen® at the Austin Film Society is an initiative of the Coolidge Corner Theatre with major support from the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation.

Watch the Trailer

Panelists

Photo of Ian Cheney

Director Ian Cheney is an Emmy-nominated and Peabody Award-winning documentary filmmaker. His 11 feature documentaries include Picture a Scientist (2020), Bluespace (2015) and The Arc of Oblivion (2023).

 

A woman in a v-neck shirt and dangling earrings smiles for the camera.

Anna Finger, LCSW, is co-director of the Gerontology Resources and the Aging Community in Education (GRACE) Scholars Program at UT Austin and a faculty member in the Steve Hicks School of Social Work. Her experience spans clinical roles and developing programs to improve outcomes for older adults and advance social work education.

A woman in a turtleneck with small dangling earrings stands in front of a building with shrubbery and smiles for the camera.

Karen Fingerman is Wilson Professor in the Department of Human Development and Family Sciences at UT Austin, director of the Texas Aging and Longevity Center and director of research for Center on Aging and Population Sciences.

A man stands in front of a bookshelf and smile while wearing a shirt branded Antonelli's Cheese.

John Antonelli is the owner of Antonelli’s Cheese Shop and the past president of the American Cheese Society. He has been honored with multiple awards and is an inducted an member of the prestigious Guilde Internationale des Fromagers.

Location

AFS Cinema
6259 Middle Fiskville Rd, Austin, TX 78752
 

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