Research > Conferences | Symposia

Conferences | Symposia

Interdisciplinary Research at Art Laboratory Berlin

Vivian Xu: Sonic Skin, 2018, exhibition view at Art Laboratory Berlin, 2021, photo: Tim Deussen

For more than ten years Art Laboratory Berlin has enhanced research based projects with international conferences and interdisciplinary symposia, as a sustainable theoretical addition next to exhibition projects, seminars and workshops.


Here you can research the individual concepts and the multidisciplinary panels of our conferences, starting in 2011. From the beginning we have worked intensely on the accessibility of these discursive events; by recording the conferences, they are now all available as video online publications.

At our conferences we have invited international scholars from various research backgrounds to speak and participate – art and media theory, art history, musicology, culture studies, design theory, literature studies, philosophy, gender studies, film studies, psychology, anthropology, biology, ecology, biophysics, neuroscience, mathematics, computer science.


Topics & Concepts


Art & Ecologies; Art & Science; Concepts of Care; Biopolitics; Body politics; Art & Neuroscience; Hybrid Art; Posthumanism; Postanthropocentric turn; The Concept of Nonhuman Subjectivities; Nonhuman sentience and agency; Networks (biological, cybernetic, social); Climate Crisis; River Research; Critical Reflection on AI, Synaesthesia.


Enjoy the debates! We are curious to receive your feedback (please send it to rapp@artlaboratory-berlin.org).

Venue

Art Laboratory Berlin,
Prinzenallee 34, 13359 Berlin

Times

2011 – ongoing

Concept

Regine Rapp & Christian de Lutz

Cooperation partners

FU Berlin
HU Berlin
TU Berlin
UdK Berlin
Uni Potsdam

Supported by

Conferences

Event Conference

HACKERS, MAKERS, THINKERS

  1. Collective Experiments in Social Fermenting
  2. International Conference (hybrid | on-site and livestream)
27 – 28 May 2022
The project Hacking, Making, Thinking proposes that Doing it With Others (DIWO) can be a way of rebuilding and re-energizing damaged social relations after the pandemic. The international conference includes presentations by artists, currently on show at ALB, and guest speakers from the artistic and curatorial practice, design, biology and anthropology. The talks critically elaborate on various artistic approaches towards (agri)culture, farming and social fermentation. A special emphasis will also have a viral discourse in connection with food and performance. The discussion will then evolve around the phenomenon of symbiosis, discussing cyanobacteria and biopolitics, including various approaches of hacking. Speakers additionally reflect critically on culture-political, post-colonial and sound-related phenomena related to khipu, human-computing, open AI as well as sound art and noise. Read more
Event Conference, Conference

UNDER THE VIRAL SHADOW

  1. Networks in the Age of Technoscience and Infection
  2. International Conference (online with livestream)
9 October 2021
In the international interdisciplinary online conference we explore various networks – biological, cybernetic, and social (watch the video recording!). It includes presentations by the artists of the group exhibition Under the Viral Shadow whose research and media are either in the life or computer sciences; as well as guest scholars from art and media theory, biophysics, and computer science, design and culture studies who explore biological, digital and social networks under the pressure of new technologies. A special keynote by Roberta Buiani discusses the multiple implications of viruses, natural and human-made in an age of technoscience and infection. Read more
Event Conference

THE CAMILLE DIARIES Symposium

  1. Current Artistic Positions on M/otherhood, Life and Care
26 September 2020
The one-day symposium brings the artists together with researchers from the humanities and natural sciences into a critical dialogue. In different panels we discuss alternative concepts of m/others, wombs and placentas, fluid inheritance and modes of care. We reflect on genetic and biochemical exchanges between human and nonhuman, both part of and remedy for the Anthropocene. Here the theme of biotechnological transfigurations of human bodies places the human being on the periphery and rather directs our full attention to other living beings – a basic understanding of other species and organisms from a feminist perspective. On the basis of the exhibited works, we discuss concepts of “Collective survival” and “Arts of noticing” (A. Tsing), “Staying with the Trouble” (D. Haraway), and in particular “Bodies of water” connected to hydrofeminism (A. Neimanis). Read more
Event Conference

Nonhuman Agents in art, culture and theory

  1. Interdisciplinary Conference
24 – 26 November 2017
The conference considers recent philosophical approaches that challenge anthropocentrism. It is about human, animal and plant intelligence, sentience and agency. As a theoretical complement to our Nonhuman Agents series (June – December 2017), Art Laboratory Berlin and our partners, the Institute for Art and Media, University of Potsdam, brought together international artists and scholars from the natural sciences and humanities from various disciplines to discuss artistic, philosophical, ethical, and scientific approaches to nonhuman agents. Previous positions from our Nonhuman Subjectivities series (2016-17) were included. Read more
Event Conference

Synaesthesia

  1. Discussing a Phenomenon in the Arts, Humanities and (Neuro-)Science
  2. Interdisciplinary Conference
5 – 6 July 2013
As a theoretical addition to our exhibition series SYNAESTHESIA (October 2012 – July 2013), Art Laboratory Berlin held an international interdisciplinary conference to further explore and theoretically question the field of multisensory perception. The term “synaesthesia”, from the Greek “aisthesis” (“Sensation”, “sensory impression”) and “syn” (“together”) means the experience of two or more sensory impressions at the same time. Currently there is a strikingly strong interest in the coupling of the senses in science, humanities and in contemporary art. This should come as no surprise: Our daily life in recent years has been subject to ever more multimedia and multisensory experiences. Comparing the latest technologies in the field of communication we come upon the radical technological development during the last 25 years: music video (text, music, colour), computer (as “total” sensory object) and also newest multiple forms of mobile phones (not only used for calls, but as a photo camera, music player or text machine, etc.). Read more





Interdisciplinary Symposium

Sol LeWitt_Symposium


19 – 20 February, 2011
More information here.





Exhibition

HACKERS, MAKERS, THINKERS

  1. Collective Experiments in Social Fermenting
  2. Irene Agrivina | Interspecifics | Pei-Ying Lin | Cammack Lindsey | Constanza Piña Pardo | Rice Brewing Sisters Club
21 May – 10 July 2022

The project series will combine artists from Latin America and Southeast Asia with Berlin based artists. In group exhibition, workshops, performances we propose art making as a tool for social empowerment and knowledge acquisition, collaboration, and working together.

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Exhibition

Under the Viral Shadow

  1. Networks in the Age of Technoscience and Infection
  2. Anna Dumitriu | Alex May | Benjamin Bacon | Gene Kogan | Sarah Grant | Vivian Xu
28 August – 10 October 2021

The group exhibition will feature internationally renowned artists such as Anna Dumitriu, Alex May, Benjamin Bacon, Gene Kogan, Sarah Grant, and Vivian Xu. The works are understood as artistic research on the interface of the biological and the technological…

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Exhibition

The Camille Diaries

  1. New Artistic Positions on M/otherhood, Life and Care
  2. Sonia Levy | Mary Maggic | Naja Ryde Ankarfeldt | Baum & Leahy | Špela Petrič | Margherita Pevere | Ai Hasegawa | Nicole Clouston | Cecilia Jonsson | Tarah Rhoda
28 August – 4 October 2020

The exhibition presents new artistic works by eleven international women and non-binary artists (installations, video, objects, performance). Reflecting on the current conditions of our world (environmental changes, gender aspects, biopolitics, etc.), the artists’ positions propose an ‘aesthetics of care’ as the basis for inter-species coexistence.

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