Please join us for the Princeton German Department’s workshop and tribute symposium, “Seismographies — Alexander Kluge's Polymorphous Urgencies” (Nov 5-6, 2026). The afternoon panels on Friday, November 6, will be livestreamed as well:
https://mediacentrallive.princeton.edu/events/2026/kluge-tribute-symposium
This two-day gathering celebrates the work of the late writer, philosopher, and filmmaker Alexander Kluge (1932–2026), whose friendship and collaboration with Princeton spanned decades. Bringing together Kluge’s collaborators in art, philosophy, and literature, the event will draw on archival holdings, film screenings, and roundtables to explore Kluge’s relationship to critical theory, his multimedia and collaborative praxis, and his intertwined understandings of historical experience, meaning, and political emotion. In addition to a symposium featuring Kluge’s scholars and interlocutors, the program features screenings of Kluge’s award-winning 1966 feature Abschied von gestern ([Yesterday Girl] in German with English subtitles; 88 mins) and Sarah Morris’s 2017 short film Finite and Infinite Games (40 mins). It will also include a seminar-style close reading of Kluge’s prose fiction and an archival workshop on Kluge’s recent approach to digital tools and video work. Open to the public, the event aims to open Kluge’s work to new audiences — and to provide interdisciplinary frameworks for scholarship still to come.
EVENT SCHEDULE

Thursday, November 5
Location: East Pyne 010
5 pm – Film Screening: Yesterday Girl / Abschied von gestern (dir. Kluge, 1966), with introductory remarks by Michael W. Jennings and a post-film discussion led by Thomas Y. Levin

Friday, November 6
Morning: workshops & screening
Location: Princeton University Art Museum, room 134 (Tuttle Lecture Hall)
9:00 am – “Constellative Collections: Orientations in Alexander Kluge's Video Work”: an archival workshop with Kizer S. Walker
10:30 am – Close reading breakout sessions
11:30 am – Film Screening: Finite and Infinite Games (dir. Morris, 2017), with an introduction by the artist Sarah Morris

Afternoon: symposium & roundtables featuring invited speakers
Location: 201 Senate Chamber, Whig Hall
2 pm – PANEL I. KLUGE & CRITICAL THEORY
Chair: Jan-Werner Müller
Featured guest speakers: Juan-Jacques Aupiais; Michael W. Jennings; Sarah Morris; Joseph Vogl
4:30 pm – PANEL II. ATLAS: KLUGE’S MULTIMEDIA PRACTICE, FROM ARCHITECTURE TO AI
Chair: Spyros Papapetros
Featured guest speakers: Gertrud Koch; Richard Langston; Irina Simova; Kizer S. Walker

Livestream afternoon panels:
https://mediacentrallive.princeton.edu/events/2026/kluge-tribute-symposium

For full event info, please visit the German Department events page or https://sites.google.com/princeton.edu/kluge