Art Laboratory Berlin | Publication Profile

For more than fifteen years, Art Laboratory Berlin (ALB) has built a distinct publication profile at the intersection of contemporary art, the natural sciences and the humanities, contributing substantively to international debates on hybrid art, art–science research, and ecological thought. The below listed publications position ALB as a sustained reference point for critical, interdisciplinary discourse on art, life sciences, neuroscience, critical AI research, and ecological futures.

Books and edited volumes: Published partly in-house and partly with academic presses such as TU Berlin University Press – have mapped out several long-term interdisciplinary research trajectories. Most recently, Matter of Flux (2024) articulates biopolitics and interdisciplinary , while Mind the Fungi (2020) constitutes a pioneering contribution to current fungi related scienctific and artistic research. In the mid-2010s, [macro]biologies & [micro]biologies (2015) and Anna Dumitriu. The Bacterial Sublime (2014) introduced the concept of the biological sublime and consolidated ALB’s engagement with the life sciences and the arts. Earlier publications explored situated artistic research – such as the artist books Why Is Green a Red Word? (2013) with an emphasis on synaesthesia and Prinzenallee (2009) with an emphasis on urban site-specificity. SEIZED (2009) opened ALB’s sustained engagement with tactical media, surveillance critique, and artistic practice and body politics.

Articles, papers, and book chapters, published with academic houses such as De Gruyter, transcript, Bloomsbury, Reimer, Metzler, Steidl, Logos, Verlag für moderne Kunst and in peer-reviewed journals (PLoS Computational Biology and Fungal Biology and Biotechnology), develop the theoretical scaffolding of ALB’s research trajectory. Recurring thematic fields include hybrid art in art science epistemologies; nonhuman subjectivities, posthumanism and more-than-human alliances; artistic research and microbiology, mycology, and biotechnology; artistic practice and ecology, climate change and marine pollution; biopolitics, leaky bodies; artistic research in scientific laboratories; as well as critical research in digital cultures, networked subjectivity, neuroscience, and AI.

BOOKS

Rapp, R. (ed.) (2024) Matter of Flux. Art, Biopolitics, and Networks with Care. Berlin: Art Laboratory Berlin. Available at: https://artlaboratory-berlin.org/publications/matter-of-flux/ (Accessed: 20 April 2026).

Meyer, V. and Rapp, R. (eds.) (2020) Mind the Fungi. Berlin: TU Berlin University Press. Available at: https://www.artlaboratory-berlin.org/assets/pdf/Mind_the_Fungi.pdf (Accessed: 20 April 2026).

Rapp, R. and de Lutz, C. (eds.) (2015) [macro]biologies & [micro]biologies. Art and the Biological Sublime in the 21st Century. Berlin: Art Laboratory Berlin. Available at: https://artlaboratory-berlin.org/assets/pdf/macrobiologiesmicrobiologies.pdf (Accessed: 20 April 2026).

de Lutz, C. and Rapp, R. (eds.) (2014) Anna Dumitriu. The Bacterial Sublime (exhibition catalogue, [micro]biologies I). Berlin: Art Laboratory Berlin.

Pedersen, D.L. (2013) Why Is Green a Red Word? (artist book). Berlin: Art Laboratory Berlin.

Szepanski, B. and Rapp, R. (eds.) (2009) Prinzenallee. Ein Stück ohne Dialoge / A Play without Dialog (artist book). Berlin: Art Laboratory Berlin.

Rapp, R. and de Lutz, C. (eds.) (2009) SEIZED. Critical Art Ensemble & Institute for Applied Autonomy. Berlin: Art Laboratory Berlin.

ARTICLES, PAPERS, BOOK CHAPTERS

Hengge, R, Douny, L., Hernandez Lobato, J. I., de Lutz, C. and Rapp, R. (2026) ‘Fermenting Textiles. The Hunter Shirt.’, (chapter) publication/ excellence cluster “Matters of Activity”, HU Berlin, 2026 (TBA)

Rapp, R. (2024) ‘Hybrid Art Histories’, in Kleine-Benne, B. (ed.) Eine Kunstgeschichte ist keine Kunstgeschichte. Kunstwissenschaftliche Perspektivierungen in Text und Bild. [An Art History is not an Art History. Art Theoretical Perspectivations in Text and Image”]. Berlin: Logos, pp. 241–259. Available at: https://www.logos-verlag.de/ebooks/OA/978-3-8325-5798-0.pdf (Accessed: 20 April 2026).

Rapp, R. and de Lutz, C. (2024) ‘Duelling Epistemologies. How Artists Hack Laboratories and Alter the Futures of Science’, in Velasco, J. and Weber, K. (eds.) Bio-Art. Varieties of the Living in Artworks from the Pre-modern to the Anthropocene. Bielefeld: transcript, pp. 181–203. Available at: https://www.transcript-verlag.de/media/pdf/8b/5b/ba/oa9783839471777L80QBOjjrn9Ut.pdf (Accessed: 20 April 2026).

de Lutz, C. and Rapp, R. (2024) ‘The Anosmatic Symposium’, in Mackenzie, L. and Nettleton, C. (eds.) Art and Biotechnology. Viral Culture from CRISPR to COVID (Biotechne: Interthinking Art, Science and Design series). London: Bloomsbury Press, p. 147–153.

Rapp, R., Erel, T. and de Lutz, C. (2024) ‘Leaky Systems. On Current Artistic Research about Body and Biopolitics’, in Rapp, R. (ed.) Matter of Flux. Art, Biopolitics, and Networks with Care. Berlin: Art Laboratory Berlin, pp. 12–27.

Rapp, R. (2024) ‘Mehr-als-menschliche Allianzen’ [More-than-human Alliances], in Ullrich, J. (ed.) Nichtmenschliche Ästhetik. Stuttgart: Metzler, pp. 125–138.

Rapp, R. (2023) ‘At the Edge. Hybrid Art and Artistic Research in Times of Ecological Mega-Crisis’, in Frye, A., Kruse, C., Majewski, A. and Schramke, S. (eds.) Let’s Get Sustainable, in Kunst, Design und Architektur. Vienna: Verlag für moderne Kunst, pp. 71–84.

Rapp, R. (2022a) ‘Ko-Existenzen. Über menschliche und nicht-menschliche Akteur:innen’ [Co-Existences. On Human and Nonhuman Agents], Kunstforum International [syn]Zusammen [bios]Leben, 281, April, pp. 82–93.

Rapp, R. (2022b) ‘Saša Spačal. Symbiosen und planetarische Verflechtungen’, Kunstforum International [syn]Zusammen [bios]Leben, 281, April, pp. 116–123.

Rapp, R. (2022c) ‘Hybrid Art’, in Grätz, R. and Vogel, J. (eds.) NaturKultur / NatureCulture. Göttingen: Steidl, pp. 75–81. (English edition 2022; German edition 2021.)

Rapp, R. and de Lutz, C. (2022) ‘Duelling Epistemologies. How Artists Hack Laboratories and Alter the Futures of Science’, in Politics of the Machine (POM) Conference Proceedings. Berlin/Copenhagen, September. doi: 10.14236/ewic/POM2021.39.

Rapp, R. and de Lutz, C. (2021) ‘Artistic Research and Ecology: Pollution, Plastic, Water’, in Reichle, I. (ed.) Plastic Ocean: Art and Science Responses to Marine Pollution. Berlin and Boston: De Gruyter, pp. 38–57.

Rillig, M.C., Bonneval, K., de Lutz, C., Lehmann, J., Mansour, I., Rapp, R. et al. (2021) ‘Ten simple rules for hosting artists in a scientific lab’, PLoS Computational Biology, 17(2), e1008675. doi: 10.1371/journal.pcbi.1008675.

Rapp, R. (2020) ‘Hybrid Art. Kunst jenseits des Anthropozentrismus’, Kunstchronik, 73(7), July, pp. 379–385.

Rapp, R. (2019a) ‘On mycohuman performances: fungi in current artistic research’, Fungal Biology and Biotechnology, 6, 22. doi: 10.1186/s40694-019-0085-6.

Rapp, R. (2019b) ‘Das Konzept “Nonhuman Subjectivities”. Aktuelle künstlerische Praktiken im Posthumanismus’ [The Concept of “Nonhuman Subjectivities”. Current Artistic Practice in Posthumanism], in Ulrich, A. and Weltzien, F. (eds.) Design und Mimesis. Berlin: Reimer, pp. 66–87.

de Lutz, C. and Rapp, R. (2018) ‘Trans-, Post- and Beyond. Some Reflections on Machines and the Biological’, in Wenzel, K. and Blohm, M. (eds.) Half Life. Maschinen und Organismen, künstlerische Positionen für eine Gegenwart von Klimawandel und Artensterben / Machines and Organisms, Artistic Positions in Times of Climate Change and Extinction. Hannover: Fabrico, pp. 14–29.

de Lutz, C. and Rapp, R. (2017) ‘Reflecting Nonhuman Subjectivities’, Interalia Magazine, September. Available at: https://www.interaliamag.org/articles/regine-rapp-christian-de-lutz-reflecting-nonhuman-subjectivities/ (Accessed: 20 April 2026).

de Lutz, C. and Rapp, R. (2016a) ‘L’art et le sublime biologique au XXIe siècle’, MCD – Magazine des cultures digitales, 81 (‘Arts & Sciences’).

de Lutz, C. and Rapp, R. (2016b) ‘Reflecting the Aesthetics of Disgust and Fear of Contagion. On Recent Art Works by Alanna Lynch’, in Goldrausch Artist Project (ed.) Fraud, Fake and Fame (exhibition catalogue). Berlin: Goldrausch Artist Project.

Rapp, R. (2016) ‘Transformation, Transliteration and Translation. Synesthesia and Multisensory Perception in Contemporary Visual Art’, in Gsöllpointner, K., Schnell, R. and Schuler, R.K. (eds.) Digital Synesthesia. A Model for the Aesthetics of Digital Art (Edition Angewandte). Berlin and Boston: De Gruyter, pp. 53–58.

Rapp, R. and de Lutz, C. (2015) ‘Art and the Biological Sublime in the 21st Century’, in Rapp, R. and de Lutz, C. (eds.) [macro]biologies & [micro]biologies. Art and the Biological Sublime in the 21st Century. Berlin: Art Laboratory Berlin, pp. 8–56.

Rapp, R. and de Lutz, C. (2014) ‘The Bacterial Sublime. Reflections on the Art of Anna Dumitriu, a Unique “Infective Agent” in the Culture of Scientific Investigation’, in Rapp, R. and de Lutz, C. (eds.) Anna Dumitriu. The Bacterial Sublime (exhibition catalogue, [micro]biologies I). Berlin: Art Laboratory Berlin, pp. 26–32.

de Lutz, C. (2013) ‘Is the Desert Still the Desert in a Digital World?’, in Louw, G. (ed.) Warnayaka Art Centre: Life in the Digital Desert. Lajamanu, N.T.: Warnayaka Art Centre, pp. 85–88.

Rapp, R. (2012) ‘”It Feels Like They Are in My Head”: Formats and Image Strategies in Gretta Louw’s Controlling_Connectivity’, in Louw, G. Controlling_Connectivity: Art, Psychology and the Internet. Berlin, pp. 36–39.

de Lutz, C. (2012) ‘”Too Artful to be a Virtual Soul”: Performance, Psychology and Social Media’, in Louw, G. Controlling_Connectivity: Art, Psychology and the Internet. Berlin, pp. 27–31.


(Last update: 20 April 2026)