Ecological Entanglements across Collections – Plant Lives and Beyond.

A collaboration between Kunsthistorisches Institut in Florenz – Max-Planck-Institut and Stiftung Preußischer Kulturbesitz.

The interdisciplinary 4A_Lab Academy "Ecological Entanglements across Collections – Plant Lives and Beyond" takes place from 4–8 November 2024 in collaboration with the Stiftung Preußischer Kulturbesitz (SPK). The academy builds on the ecocritical turn in the humanities and explores the role of plant life in artistic and aesthetic practices, human knowledge production, and theoretical critical thinking across histories, communities, and geographies. Through a series of panels, lectures, workshops, collection visits, and performances, the academy invites participants to collectively (re)think human entanglements with vegetal and non-human life, in dialogue with the collections of the SPK.

Program

Events and lectures will take place on-site, are open to the public, and will be mostly accessible online via pre-registration.

Events with a limited number of participants are marked * Please register.

Monday, 4 November 2024
Forschungscampus Dahlem, Foyer

10.00
Welcome & Introduction to the Academy by KHI & SPK
Barbara Göbel (Director, Ibero-Amerikanisches Institut, SPK, Berlin) and Hannah Baader (4A_Lab/Kunsthistorisches Institut in Florenz, MPI)
WORKSHOP
Ecological Entanglements and Aesthetic Practices: Reassessing Discourses, Imaginations, and Common Sense
10.15
Introduction
Hannah Baader (Kunsthistorisches Institut in Florenz, MPI)
10.30
Giovanni Aloi (School of the Art Institute of Chicago)
Reconfiguring the Botanical Gaze: Overcoming Plant Blindness to Embrace Rewilding
Moderation and Discussion: Hannah Baader (Kunsthistorisches Institut in Florenz, MPI)
11.15
Anna Blume (State University of New York, FIT)
Maya Cloud Forests and Muybridge Photographs: A Study of Root Memory and the Optical Unconscious
Moderation and Discussion: Julia Voss (Deutsches Historisches Museum, Berlin/Leuphana University, Lüneburg)
12.30 Lunch Break
13.30
Peter J. Schneemann (Universität Bern)
The Empty Lot: Of Remediating Brownfields and Resisting Vegetation
Moderation and Discussion: Linn Burchert (Zentralinstitut für Kunstgeschichte, Munich)
14.15
Etienne Benson (Max PIanck Institute for the History of Science, Berlin)
Aesthetic Impact Assessment, 1949/1969
Moderation and Discussion: Gerhard Wolf (Kunsthistorisches Institut in Florenz, MPI)
15.30 Coffee Break
16.00
Presentation
Thiago Lopes da Costa Oliveira (Research Fellow Ethnologisches Museum, SPK, Berlin)
Curating and Creating Relations between Lived Worlds: A Practice-Oriented Methodology for Museum Engagements with Indigenous Communities from Amazonia
Connect – Comprehend – Communicate: Amazonia as a future laboratory |
Vernetzen – Verstehen – Vermitteln: Amazonien als Zukunftslabor
Moderation: Patricia Rahemipour (Institut für Museumsforschung, Berlin)
17.00
Lecture
Monica Gagliano (Southern Cross University, Lismore)
Ecological Wisdom for a Collective Future: If We Listen, Plants Will Teach Us
Moderation and Discussion: Julia Voss (Deutsches Historisches Museum, Berlin/Leuphana Universität, Lüneburg)
18.00
Reception
Welcome by Hermann Parzinger (President, Stiftung Preußischer Kulturbesitz)

19.00
Forschungscampus Dahlem, Lecture Hall
LECTURE PERFORMANCE
Holding Patterns; An Archive of Atmospheres
An artistic research-exchange project made by artists and academics Kate Donovan (Berlin) and Ella Finer (London) in collaboration with:
Maurice Mengel (Head of Media, Ethnologisches Museum and Museum für Asiatische Kunst); Albrecht Wiedmann (Curator, Berliner Phonogramm-Archiv, Ethnologisches Museum); Ludwig Luthardt (Museum für Naturkunde), Berlin. Richard Sabin (Natural History Museum); Dan Hall (Natural History Museum); Michele Banal (British Library Sound Archive), London. With the use of streamboxes by Soundcamp and the live technical support of Philipp Phildius.

Tuesday, 5 November 2024
Hamburger Bahnhof – Nationalgalerie der Gegenwart, Aktionsraum

PANEL I
Colonial Coordinates of Ecology and Contemporary Art
10.30
Welcome & Introduction
Gabriele Knapstein (Deputy Director and Head of Collections, Hamburger Bahnhof – Nationalgalerie der Gegenwart, SPK, Berlin) and Hannah Baader (Kunsthistorisches Institut in Florenz, MPI)
CHAIR
Eric de Bruyn (Freie Universität Berlin)
10.45
Christopher Williams-Wynn (4A_Lab)
“A Framework for Control and Change:” Coloniality and Ecology at the Centre for Art and Communication, c. 1971
11.15
Zachary Caple (Aarhus University/Duke University, Durham)
A Digested Land: The Industrial Metabolism and Auto-rewilding of Bone Valley, Florida
11.45
Sria Chatterjee (Paul Mellon Centre, London)
Political Plants?
RESPONDENT
Peter J. Schneemann (Universität Bern)
13.00 Lunch Break
CHAIR
Robert Stock (Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin)
14.00
James Nisbet (University of California, Irvine)
Illustrating Invasion
14.30
André Rottmann (Europa-Universität Viadrina Frankfurt/O.)
Masks and Machines: Notes on AI Ecologies and Decolonial Thought
RESPONDENT
Anna Blume (State University of New York, FIT)
DISCUSSANTS
Giovanni Aloi (School of the Art Institute of Chicago), Anna Blume (State University of New York, FIT), Monica Gagliano (Southern Cross University, Lismore), Peter J. Schneemann (Universität Bern)
15.30 Coffee Break and Transfer

16.30
COLLECTION VISIT – participants only
Museum für Naturkunde, (paleo-)botanical collection
Depot, Reuchlinstr. 10-11, 10553 Berlin
With Ludwig Luthardt (Curator (paleo-)botanical collection, Museum für Naturkunde, Berlin)

Wednesday, 6 November 2024
Simón Bolívar Lecture Hall, Ibero-Amerikanisches Institut/Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin

PANEL II
Paradise Drama: Vegetability, Power, and Resistance in Safavid Isfahan, Qing Kangxi, and Pre/Colonial Awadh
CHAIR
Sinem Casale (Kunsthistorisches Institut in Florenz, MPI/University of Minnesota)
10.45
Mahroo Moosavi (4A_Lab)
Isfahan through the Safavid Prose and Verse Shahr-āshūb(s): From I‘jāz-i Hiravī’s Rāgh to Vaḥīd-i Qazvīnī’s Bāgh
RESPONDENT
Sussan Babaie (The Courtauld Institute of Art, London)
CHAIR
Margrit Pernau (Max Planck Institute for Human Development, Berlin)
11.45
Parul Singh (4A_Lab)
Contested Paradises: Aesthetics of Order and Morality in Nawabi and Colonial Gardens in Lucknow in the 19th Century
RESPONDENT
Sunil Khilnani (Ashoka University, Sonipat)
12.45 Coffee Break
CHAIR
Sinem Casale (Kunsthistorisches Institut in Florenz, MPI/University of Minnesota)
12.00
Feng Schöneweiß (4A_Lab)
The Depth of Surface. The Ecologies of Lacquer from Late Imperial China to Contemporary Berlin
RESPONDENTS
Birgitta Augustin (Curator, Museum für Asiatische Kunst, Berlin)
Wenyi Qian (Kunsthistorisches Institut in Florenz, MPI)
13.00 Lunch Break

14.00
VISIT
Oriental Department, Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin, Dietrich-Bonhoeffer Hall
Presentation by Christoph Rauch (Head, Oriental Department, Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin)
Introduction to the Collection of Persian Manuscripts at the Oriental Department
Collection workshop with Christoph Rauch, Mahroo Moosavi (4A_Lab), and Parul Singh (4A_Lab)
Persianate Compilations of the 16th and 17th Centuries: The Berlin State Library's Treasures
15.30 Coffee Break
LECTURES
Simón Bolívar Lecture Hall, Ibero-Amerikanisches Institut
16.00
Stefan Weber (Director, Museum für Islamische Kunst, Berlin) – remote
More than Ornament: Gardens, Scents, and Plants in the New Display of the Museum of Islamic Art
Moderation and Discussion: Sinem Casale (Kunsthistorisches Institut in Florenz, MPI/University of Minnesota)
16.45
Sussan Babaie (The Courtauld Institute of Art, London)
Plant Sense. Why do Nomads need Gardens?

Moderation and Discussion: Christoph Rauch (Oriental Department, Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin)

Thursday, 7 November 2024
Kulturforum, KGM Lecture Hall

PANEL III
Plants and the Senses in Visual, Linguistic, and Sound Cultures
CHAIR
Stefan Neuner (Universität der Künste Berlin)
10.15
Lea Viehweger (4A_Lab)
Capturing Scent? Flowers in Early 16th Century German Portraits between the Sensory and the Symbolic
11.00
Daniela Hacke (Freie Universität Berlin) and Jason C. J. Terry (Freie Universität Berlin)
"We have no words for many." Senses and Language in 17th Century English Colonial Botany
RESPONDENT
Jasmin Mersmann (Freie Universität Berlin)
12.00
Ulrike G. K. Wegst (Northeastern University, Boston) and Rebecca Wolf (Director, Staatliches Institut für Musikforschung, Berlin)
Materials and Materiality in Music
13.00 Lunch Break
14.00
COLLECTION WORKSHOP – participants only
Staatliches Institut für Musikforschung, Musikinstrumenten-Museum
Holz hören/The Audibility of Wood with Rebecca Wolf (Director, Staatliches Institut für Musikforschung, Berlin) and Ulrike G. K. Wegst (Northeastern University, Boston)
Workshop on the diversity of wood in musical instrument making based on the collection of the Musikinstrumenten-Museum.
15.30 Coffee Break
16.00
VISIT AND SOLO PERFORMANCE *
Gemäldegalerie, Gallery Space
Solo Performance by Margret Koell, historical baroque harp
Plant Songs in Renaissance and Baroque Music

17.00
PUBLIC GUIDED TOUR *
Gemäldegalerie, Gallery Space
Parallel guided tours
with Lea Viehweger (4A_Lab)
Nightshade, Men’s Fidelity, and Star’s Herb: Plants in Portraits by Albrecht Dürer and Contemporaries
and Stephan Kemperdick (Curator, Gemäldegalerie, Berlin)
Pflanzenbilder. Sprache, Sinne, Malkunst
in English and German

Friday, 8 November 2024
Museum für Fotografie, Fürstensaal

Panel IV
Plants’ Photography. Contradictions of Form and Coloniality
CHAIR
Carlotta Castellani (Università degli Studi di Urbino Carlo Bo)
10.15
Ulrike Meyer Stump (Zurich University of the Arts)
Plants as Monuments: From Karl Blossfeldt’s Urformen der Kunst (1928) to Las Pozas Gardens in Mexico (1962-1984)
11.00
Liliana Gómez (Universität Kassel)
“The World was my Garden.” Photography and Botany’s Modern Materialities
RESPONDENT
Kärin Nickelsen (Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München/Wissenschaftskolleg zu Berlin)
12.15 Lunch Break
13.15
COLLECTION WORKSHOP – participants only
Introduction to the Museum‘s Photographic Collection and its Plant Photographies
Christine Kühn (Curator, Collection of Photography, Kunstbibliothek, Berlin) and
Friederike Eden (Research Assistant, Collection of Photography, Kunstbibliothek, Berlin)
14.30
Round Table
On Ecological Entanglements across Collections. Disciplines, Systems of Knowledge, and Curatorial Practice
With Monica Juneja (Heidelberg University), Kärin Nickelsen (Ludwig-Maximilians-Universität München/Wissenschaftskolleg zu Berlin), Franziska Nori (Director, Frankfurter Kunstverein), and Alexis von Poser (Deputy Director, Ethnologisches Museum and Museum für Asiatische Kunst, Berlin)
Moderation: Hannah Baader (Kunsthistorisches Institut in Florenz, MPI)

End 16.00

Concept and Organisation:
Hannah Baader & 4A_Lab team in collaboration with
Stiftung Preußischer Kulturbesitz

Contact:
Antje Paul
4a_labkhi.fi.it

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Via Giuseppe Giusti 44
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