CollActive Materials brings people from the scientific realm and civil society together in workshops and exhibitions in order to engage in co-speculation: Could the future be grasped differently?
CollActive Materials is guided by its belief that a number of current research challenges need to be brought into a direct exchange with expertise from civil society – in particular challenges relating to materials and their future uses. We see co-speculation as a technique that inspires such encounters in novel ways.
The project is conceived as a way to utilize co-designing with diverse groups in the public realm in order to make an active contribution to the evolving field of science communication, public engagement, and knowledge exchange. At the same time, our work is aimed at the scholarly and scientific communities – from the humanities to design research and the engineering sciences, whereby our goal is to make our approach of collaborative speculation available to transdisciplinary research.
Photos: © SCIoI
Team
Dr. Kristin Werner is a science communicator and public engagement professional. Drawing on her background as a natural scientist, Kristin is dedicated to finding new forms of meaningful knowledge exchange between research, art, applied expertise, and civil society. As coordinator of CollActive Materials, Kristin guides the project’s strategic direction, designs and facilitates co-speculation workshops, manages exhibitions, and shares the project’s speculative approaches with transdisciplinary researchers and the growing community of public engagement practitioners.
Dr. Léa Perraudin is project leader of CollActive Materials. A particular concern of her work are nuanced forms of collaboration between design, critical research and material everyday practices in the face of the current ecological and geopolitical predicament. For CollActive Materials, Léa is dedicated to developing collaborative speculation in transdisciplinary contexts, providing the scientific concept for a new approach to materials and their environments. Together with Martin Müller, Léa curated the project’s exhibition »AIRBOUND« (2023). Her research and teaching at the Cluster of Excellence »Matters of Activity« focuses on environmental media studies and queer-feminist science and technology studies. Her most recent publications are the book Elementare Ekstasen. Sondierungen der Technosphäre (meson, OA, 2024) and the volume, co-edited with Clemens Winkler, Claudia Mareis und Matthias Held, Material Trajectories. Designing with Care? (meson, OA, 2023).
Dr. Martin Müller is project leader of CollActive Materials. His research focuses on inter/transdisciplinary methodologies with the aim of facilitating integrative knowledge exchange between the sciences, humanities, arts, design and civil society. Martin’s work involves the development of collaborative speculative designs with the aim of addressing the ecological challenges posed by materials research and the current climate debate. Together with Léa Perraudin, he curated the exhibition »AIRBOUND« (2023). He also researches and teaches as a project leader and postdoc at the Cluster of Excellence »Matters of Activity« and at the Institute for Cultural History and Theory at Humboldt University Berlin. His most recent book is Leben machen. Die Zoëpolitik der synthetischen Biologie (print+OA 2023). Martin is currently working on a book project on the history and theory of air, which critically examines the technologies of climate engineering and the vulnerability of breathing in the 20th century.
Eva Bullermann is a designer. As project assistant for CollActive Materials, she supported the design of the workshops and exhibitions. Eva studied product design at Kunsthochschule Kassel. In her thesis and her work in the BioLab KhK, she dealt creatively and experimentally with living fungi and their material habitats. She completed her master’s degree in textile and surface design at the weißensee kunsthochschule berlin with a thesis on »Designing with Cellulose, Water and Air« under Prof Dr Karola Dierichs. Her work was one of the starting points for a speculation workshop and an accompanying exhibition at Futurium Berlin.
Antje Nestler is a science communicator within the Cluster of Excellence »Matters of Activity« and Principal Investigator for CollActive Materials. With a background in Communication and Language studies and knowledge transfer through scientific exhibitions, Antje is testing experimental formats for public engagement. At »Matters of Activity«, she played a key role in setting up the Cluster’s showroom, the Activarium, where visitors can experience prototypes of the interdisciplinary research on active materials like bark, biofilm, or mycelium. Furthermore, Antje is a freelance science communicator, sharing research insights and sparking conversation about what lies ahead.
Solveig Steinhardt obtained her Master’s Degree in Natural Science with a focus on Coastal Geomorphology from the University of Florence, Italy, and then pursued a career in journalism and communication. After six years as the chief editor of a magazine in Berlin, she landed at SCIoI where she is responsible for science communication and relations with the press.
Prof. Dr. Claudia Mareis is an expert for Design as well as Cultural History and Theory. She is Professor of Design and History of Knowledge at the Institute for Cultural History and Theory and Co-Director of the Cluster of Excellence »Matters of Activity« at Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin. From 2013 to 2021, she directed the Institute for Experimental Design and Media Cultures (IXDM) at the FHNW Academy of Art and Design in Basel, where she has built up a pioneering interdisciplinary research group converging Design, Media Arts, Anthropology, Historical Studies, and Technology. For CollActive Materials, she contributes her research expertise on experimental design and media practices, the cultural history of creativity as well as design and material politics.
Prof. Dr. Wolfgang Schäffner is director of the Cluster of Excellence »Matters of Activity« and contributes to CollActive Materials with his theoretical and historical expertise on technologies, materials and knowledge architectures. As part of the experimental laboratory, he explores collaborative forms of knowledge production in which the humanities, natural sciences and design disciplines conduct research together with society. Wolfgang has been Professor of the Cultural History of Knowledge at the Institute for Cultural History and Theory at Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin since 2009 and a permanent visiting professor at the Faculty of Architecture, Design and Urbanism at the Universidad de Buenos Aires since 2005. His main area of research is the history and theory of analogue code.
Prof. Dr. Oliver Brock is a computer scientist and spokesperson of the Cluster of Excellence »Science of Intelligence« at TU Berlin. His research focuses on robotics and artificial and natural embodied intelligence with a particular emphasis on the complex interaction between systems and their environments. For CollActive Materials, he is drawing on his expertise for a new engineering paradigm and experimentation with alternative materials for intelligent technological systems.
