Events

Event | Workshop

CHRYSALIS. ARTISTS IN LABS

  1. Pond Codex: Of Life and Death in Berlin's Small Water Bodies
  2. Workshop with Margherita Pevere and Germán Joosten
Sun, 10 May 2026, 11:00 - 18:00
a lake or pond surrounded by trees flasks and graduated cylinder son a table people sitting in the background
Margherita Pevere and Germán Joosten invite the audience to join the life cycle of Berlin’s ponds and small lakes. Acting as biodiversity hotspots and regulators of temperature, these small water bodies play a key role in urban ecology. Among their dwellers is Daphnia – commonly known as water flea – a small invertebrate which feeds on phytoplankton (microscopic algae), thus keeping phenomena like algae blooms in check. Its life cycle is fascinating: it reproduces mostly through cloning itself, but when things get rough, it can adapt to the environment, switch to sexual reproduction, and produce eggs that remain dormant in the sediment until better conditions arise. Daphnia can reveal much about the health, history, and possible futures of the small urban water bodies. Through hands-on sessions and speculative storytelling, workshop participants will assume a pond’s more-than-human perspective and explore Berlin as seen by its small aquatic inhabitants. Read more
Event | Meet up, Talk

ART SCIENCE MEET UP

  1. Research Exchange and Get-Together
  2. With Fara Peluso, Jemma Woolmore, and Matthias Rillig
Wed, 29 April 2026
Art Laboratory Berlin and the Rillig Lab host an Art Science Meet Up in Berlin, bringing together artists and scientists interested in interdisciplinary research. The first session, open to the public, features presentations on current projects: Fara Peluso explores DIY bioplastics and community gardening to rethink human–ecological relations; Jemma Woolmore investigates chemical pollution through collaborative and embodied artistic methods; and Matthias Rillig presents research on how ecosystems respond to combined environmental pressures such as climate change, pollution, and land use. The second session invites participating artists and scientists to collaboratively design experimental approaches, discussing methods, concepts, and formats for joint research, followed by group exchange and collective reflection. Read more
Event | Colloquium

IN-PROGRESS… | COLLOQUIUM

  1. Research in Art, Science, and Humanities
  2. With Karolina Żyniewicz and Regine Hengge
Tue, 17 March 2026 (online only)
close up of a sculpture, circles with metal mesh, yellowish cat to the photograph Trees photographed from below with a green-yellow cast to the photograph
The Colloquium (on 17 March online only) addresses an international interdisciplinary research audience to present and discuss past, present, or future projects by artists and scholars, curators or editors from the fields of art, science, and the humanities. The topics could refer to an art project, a book, text or chapter, a research or exhibition project, a lab experiment, a lecture series, a conference concept, or other. The presentations and exchange will focus on the work-in-progress. Methodological approaches – theoretical or practical – are also of great interest here. While researching, we often tend to shift between practical inquiry and theoretical research, browsing various disciplines. Following the original meaning of colloquium as “speaking together”, we want to provide a platform for exchange and embrace various kinds of work processes which are often not seen or talked about. Read more
Event | Video documentation

Art Laboratory Berlin 2025

  1. Video Documentation
A Year in Review 2025
A huge thank you to the ALB team, to all the artists, researchers, and contributors, to our open-minded and wonderful public, and to our cooperation partners and colleagues for sharing this year with us. Our ‘YEAR IN REVIEW 2025’ video offers a glimpse of the encounters, experiments, conversations, and collaborations that shaped our year. And heartfelt thanks to the participants of our 2025 programme and to the institutions that supported it! Read more
Event | Workshop

CHRYSALIS. ARTISTS IN LABS

  1. Ideologies in the Machine: Political Bias in Large Language Models
  2. Workshop with Helena Nikonole
Fri, 12 December 2025
animal created by AI
This hands-on workshop with artist and researcher Helena Nikonole, pursuing a PhD at the University of Applied Arts Vienna (Die Angewandte) on Large Language Models and Political Ideologies, explores how contemporary AI systems encode and reproduce ideological narratives. The event takes place in the framework of the project CHRYSALIS. Artists in Labs, organised by Art Laboratory Berlin in cooperation with Berlin Open Lab and other cooperation partners, with the generous support of the Lotto Stiftung Berlin. The workshop will take place in the Einstein Center for Digital Future in Berlin Mitte. Focusing on Large Language Models (LLMs) such as ChatGPT, Claude, and Gemini, as well as derivative systems like text-to-image generators, participants will investigate how AI reproduces political bias and ideological framing through language and visual representation. Through experiments with politically charged prompts, participants will analyze how these models interpret ideology, shape discourse, and amplify systemic bias. Read more
Event | Talk

CHRYSALIS. ARTISTS IN LABS

  1. Artist Scientist Dialogue
  2. With Julius Holtz and Julia von Thienen
Fri, 28 November 2025, 7 pm
Join us for the first of several upcoming ARTIST SCIENTIST DIALOGUES that will take place in the context of the current research project CHRYSALIS. ARTISTS IN LABS at Art Laboratory Berlin. Composer and sound researcher Julius Holtz, one of the CHRYSALIS artists in residence, will speak in dialogue with Prof. Dr. Julia von Thienen from the German University of Digital Science. Julia von Thienen is a researcher, educator, and innovator at the intersection of digital engineering and collaborative creativity. Julia’s research in the field of Sonic Thinking and Neuro Design at the Hasso Plattner Institute inspired Julius Holtz’ current artistic investigations into the relationship of sound and Brain Computer Interfaces. In addition, Julius will discuss his artistic research into the interaction among participants, sound environments, the formation of (self-)consciousness, and the creation of spaces that invite active listening. Through technical, biological, and conceptual insights into the design of his Brain Computer Interface enhanced listening sessions, Julius will demonstrate how he translates mind activity into sound compositions via real-time data sonification. Read more
Event | Panel Discussion

CHRYSALIS. ARTISTS IN LABS

  1. Panel Discussion | With Helena Nikonole, Álvaro Rodríguez, Julius Holtz, Ludmila Litvin, Margherita Pevere, Germán Joosten, Regine Rapp, and Christian de Lutz
@ BSW Holzmarkt 25, 8 November 2025, 13-14:30
Join the presentation of our current research project CHRYSALIS. ARTISTS IN LABS at the Berlin Science Week 2025 on 8 November 2025. We will give an insight into Berlin-based artists researching in Berlin science labs – with topics on neuroscience, artificial intelligence, biodiversity, and ecology! During 2025 and 2026, Art Laboratory Berlin is unfolding the new innovative project CHRYSALIS. ARTISTS IN LABS with an interdisciplinary exchange between art and science in Berlin science laboratories. Building on Berlin’s unique status as a global centre for arts and sciences, we aim to create new synergies based on topics of current research. In collaboration with a consortium of scientists from all three Berlin universities, the Charité, and the University of the Arts Berlin, Art Laboratory Berlin is initiating artist-in-lab residencies for four internationally recognized, Berlin-based artists – Helena Nikonole, Julius Holtz, Sybille Neumeyer, and Margherita Pevere. We expect strong outcomes in transdisciplinary knowledge transfer, artistic research, art science communication, and some new artworks highlighting 21st-century innovations. In this year’s BSW panel discussion we present three artists of the project CHRYSALIS together with their scientific partners of the respective Berlin science laboratories. Read more
Event | Festival

BODIES OF WATER

  1. Learning from the River Panke through Art, Science, and Storytelling
  2. Workshops, Walks, Talks, Reading Sessions, Panel Discussions, Performances
21 - 22 June 2025
Art Laboratory Berlin welcomes you to the two-day festival BODIES OF WATER exploring themes around urban waterways, in context of the ongoing series ON WATER | PARCOURS by the Berlin University Alliance (BUA). With the art science collective DIY Hack the Panke and scientists from the fields of eco hydrology and medicine, we will explore what forms an urban river takes and what lives in and around the Panke river. There will be workshops, walks, talks, reading sessions, panel discussions, and performances for participants of all ages. Let’s embark on a multi sensorial and transdisciplinary journey along one of Berlin’s fastest flowing bodies of water! Join us on 21 and 22 June to explore our connectedness to water, urban waterways, and the river Panke through learning, crafting, sensing, walking, and listening. Read more
Event | Colloquium

IN-PROGRESS… | COLLOQUIUM

  1. Research in Art, Science, and Humanities
  2. With Robertina Šebjanič and Marco Barotti
8 April 2025, online only
close up of a sculpture, circles with metal mesh, yellowish cat to the photograph Trees photographed from below with a green-yellow cast to the photograph
The Colloquium (on 8 April it will be online) addresses an international interdisciplinary research audience to present and discuss past, present, or future projects by artists and scholars, curators or editors from the fields of art, science, and the humanities. The topics could refer to an art project, a book, text or chapter, a research or exhibition project, a lab experiment, a lecture series, a conference concept, or other. The presentations and exchange will focus on the work-in-progress. Methodological approaches – theoretical or practical – are also of great interest here. While researching, we often tend to shift between practical inquiry and theoretical research, browsing various disciplines. Following the original meaning of colloquium as “speaking together”, we want to provide a platform for exchange and embrace various kinds of work processes which are often not seen or talked about. Read more
Event | Workshop

Politics of AI

  1. Artistic Research
  2. With Helena Nikonole
29 March 2025
WORKSHOP FULLY BOOKED /// The hands-on workshop Politics of AI with artist and researcher Helena Nikonole explores how Large Language Models (LLMs) like ChatGPT, Claude, and Gemini, as well as text-to-image AI systems, reproduce biases and embed political ideologies. Participants will experiment with AI-generated responses to politically charged prompts, analyze biases in text-based AI outputs, and examine how these biases extend into AI-generated imagery. Through practical exercises, we will critically assess how AI models shape narratives, reinforce stereotypes, and amplify bias through a feedback loop. Helena Nikonole will share her insights and artistic methodology, demonstrating how artistic research can serve as a critical tool for exposing and subverting AI biases. Read more

Archive

close up of a sculpture, circles with metal mesh, yellowish cat to the photograph Trees photographed from below with a green-yellow cast to the photograph
Event | Colloquium

IN-PROGRESS… | COLLOQUIUM

  1. Research in Art, Science, and Humanities
  2. With Saša Spačal and Joana MacLean
8 November 2022

The Colloquium addresses an international interdisciplinary research audience to present and discuss past, present or future projects by artists, scholars, curators or editors from the fields of art, science and the humanities, focusing on the work-in-progress.

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Event | Workshop

PANKE INTERVENTIONS

  1. The Materiality of Ghosts
  2. Workshop | Cammack Lindsey
30 October 2022

In this workshop we will explore ghosts in relation to historical and environmental relics with intimate discussions, readings, and written poetry. We will experiment with our voices and harmonies, while learning about breathing and our body resonance to amplify our stories together in a final composition of our poems through a performance.

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Event | Reading Club

Inspired by…

  1. Reading Club
  2. With Guest Artist SU Yu Hsin
11 October 2022

Inspired by… is an event series, a hybrid format derived from reading group and artist talk formats. In each session, an invited artist will choose a specific text or excerpt from a book that was inspirational for the artist’s practice and/or a particular project that the artist will introduce.

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Event | Workshop

PANKE INTERVENTIONS

  1. Wetland Ecologies: Life in Transitional Zones 
  2. Workshop | Sarah Hermanutz, India Mansour, Fara Peluso
8 October 2022

In the workshop the artist, the designer and the biologist will introduce the participants to the river Panke and changing perceptions of wetlands and essential ecosystems – through situating, storytelling, contextualizing, experiencing, sampling, examining, collaborating.

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Event | Walk & Talk

HACK THE PANKE Festival

  1. Reflecting Symbiosis
  2. Walk & Talk | Saša Spačal and Matthias Rillig
3 October 2022

In our last event of the festival artist Saša Spačal will introduce us into her artistic research about symbiosis and interspecies entanglements. Ecologist Matthias Rillig will give us an insight into his research on soil and plant ecologies especially on the symbiosis of arbuscular mycorrhizal fungi with plants.

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Event | Workshop

PANKE INTERVENTIONS

  1. Taphonomy of Trash
  2. Workshop | Kat Austen
1 October 2022

Based on research developed for the Palaeoplasticene project’s Open Artistic Research Platform, participants will be introduced to the concept of incidental taphonomy, exploring the transience of organic existence and humanity’s relationship to long-lasting materials such as plastic.

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Event | Festival

HACK THE PANKE Festival

  1. Program Overview
  2. Festival with artists and scientists
September - October 2022

Art Laboratory Berlin welcomes you to the HACK THE PANKE Festival on art, science and sound in Berlin Wedding during summer 2022. The festival takes place as a part of Draussenstadt Call for Action program. All the events are free. For taking part in the workshops, it is necessary to sign up.

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Event | Workshop

HACK THE PANKE Festival

  1. Mycelium Radio
  2. Workshop & Performance | Martin Howse
24 - 25 September 2022

Radio Mycelium proposes the construction of a series of experimental situations examining a new networked imaginary, the single organism of the fungal mycelium, in relation to local, global and universal electromagnetic signals. Within this two-day workshop we will build DIY radio receivers and sculptural antennae.

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Event | Workshop

PANKE INTERVENTIONS

  1. Kentanggung
  2. Workshop & Lecture | Ariel Orah and Michelle Lai (Soydivision)
23 September 2022

Tracing the historical, migratory pathways undertaken by the spud, we propose an ode to the potato, this  participatory research workshop explores the spectre of histories and imaginations that the potato, as a seed of desire and delight contains.

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close up of a sculpture, circles with metal mesh, yellowish cat to the photograph Trees photographed from below with a green-yellow cast to the photograph
Event | Colloquium

IN-PROGRESS… | COLLOQUIUM

  1. Research in Art, Science, and Humanities
  2. With Margherita Pevere and Dolores Steinman
20 September 2022

The Colloquium addresses an international interdisciplinary research audience to present and discuss past, present or future projects by artists, scholars, curators or editors from the fields of art, science and the humanities, focusing on the work-in-progress.

Read more
Event | Walk & Talk

HACK THE PANKE Festival

  1. Rituals and Reflections
  2. Walk & Talk | Nenad Popov & James Whitehead
18 September 2022

With media and sound artist Nenad Popov and biologist James Whitehead participants will investigate the impact of drought and climate stress on the Panke river. How have low water levels effected nearby soils and vegetation? What signs of urban civilisation – like trash, but also river engineering – are being uncovered?

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Event | Walk & Talk

HACK THE PANKE Festival

  1. Meandering – Or, the Rights to Flow
  2. Walk & Talk | Sybille Neumeyer & India Mansour
11 September 2022

Together with microbial ecologist India Mansour and artist Sybille Neumeyer participants will trace the constant transformations that surround the Panke, meandering with the past, present and possible futures of the river. Considering the cycles of biological, cultural and political matters, the group will tune into the multiple voices of, in and around the water.

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Event | Workshop

HACK THE PANKE Festival

  1. From Here to Ear: Sound Exploration
  2. Workshop | Tad Ermitaño
4 September 2022

The workshop is a sound art creation activity designed to encourage participants to listen to their environment with intention. It reframes listening as a way of thinking towards an act of reflection. Sonification is a way of experiencing data and the world anew.

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Event | Film Screening

HACK THE PANKE Festival

  1. Tales of Weird Science and Cosmic Covenants
  2. Film Screening | Tad Ermitaño
3 September 2022

Tad Ermitaño will show some of his film and video works, sketching an uneasy field in which a facility with technology collides with a kind of postcolonial guilt slamming its head against the limits of empiricism.

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Event | Workshop

HACK THE PANKE Festival

  1. Methods of Extraction: Exploring Piezo-Electricty and Hydrophones for Non(Less) Invasive Uses for Data Collection
  2. Workshop | Cammack Lindsey
3 September 2022

In this workshop we reclaim the topic of piezoelectric crystal for public use and think critically about the development of these tools and their outcome. When collecting data, we are extracting from and entering a watery space that is of nonhuman organisms and life.

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