#126 Mastering Connections: A Conversation with Joe Navarro

Saturday, September 12th Live on Zoom

10am Los Angeles / 1pm New York / 6pm London / 7pm Florence

What can a handprint on a cave wall tell us about being human? And what connects the earliest images made tens of thousands of years ago to the art of Michelangelo and Leonardo da Vinci?

In this special conversation, bestselling author and former FBI agent Joe Navarro joins Paola to explore an unexpected idea: that art has always helped prepare us for life. Beginning with the astonishing prehistoric images preserved in the caves of Europe—created in darkness, by firelight, tens of thousands of years before the Renaissance—they will trace our enduring impulse to observe, create, communicate, and make meaning.

Moving from cave walls to Etruscan tombs, Roman mosaics, and the revolutionary curiosity of Leonardo and Michelangelo, Joe and Paola will consider how art reflects the environments that shape us while also revealing something fundamental about the human mind. Why did our ancestors make beautiful things even when survival was precarious? What does art teach us about attention, curiosity, connection, and our ability to understand one another?

Drawing on ideas from Joe’s latest book, Mastering Connections, the conversation will bring together art, human behavior, and the lessons of a lifetime spent studying how people communicate. It is an invitation to look at some of humanity’s greatest artistic achievements from an entirely different perspective—not simply as objects of beauty, but as evidence of who we are and how we learned to navigate the world.

Joe Navarro is a former FBI special agent, spy catcher, self-trained ethologist and scientific researcher, and the author of 15 books. During his 25-year career with the FBI, he specialized in behavioral assessment and the interpretation of nonverbal behavior, developing an extraordinary understanding of how we reveal ourselves through gesture, expression, and action. His bestselling books, including What Every BODY Is Saying and The Dictionary of Body Language, have introduced millions of readers to the hidden signals that shape human interaction. In his latest book, Mastering Connections, he turns his attention to the qualities and behaviors that allow us to build stronger, more meaningful relationships.

To RSVP: Paola50122@gmail.com

Minimum suggested donation: $28

This talk is free for Friends of Paola's Studiolo!

Look forward to seeing you on Zoom!