Dear friends of »Matters of Activity«,

In the last issue of CZ# this year, we look back on the final PhD presentations, a rousing Science Slam at Berlin Science Week, and the closing of the ＿matter Festival 2025. We join our members in celebrating exciting new publications, awards, and new professional opportunities!

Enjoy reading!
Carolin Ott

It’s a wrap! Last weekend, the Cluster celebrated the end of the ＿matter Festival 2025 with a closing event at Kunstgewerbemuseum in Berlin. Since April 2025, exhibitions, workshops and talks held at eleven places around Berlin have made us see materials in a new way, as things that are not just passive, ahistorical substances. Over 1,500 guests attended the opening events of the exhibition series, and many more visited the shows during opening hours and attended the accompanying events. Various media outlets, including Deutschlandfunk, Tagesspiegel and taz, covered aspects of the festival program. Access the Press Review of the ＿matter Festival 2025 via this → link.

On October 14th, the »Matters of Activity« doctoral cohort, comprising various disciplines ranging from art and architecture to engineering, design, the humanities, and natural sciences, approached the topic of fragmented futures from their respective research backgrounds. Their research spans the techno-cultural dimension of collaboration between human and material actors. The public review featured short presentations, plenary discussions, and offered an opportunity to engage with both the researchers and a curated selection of their research objects. It was well attended, with a great atmosphere and many inspiring conversations that continued after the official segment.

Speculative Design In light of growing global uncertainties, the future is less predictable than ever before. An article by Cluster Co-Director Claudia Mareis, Professor of Design and History of Knowledge at Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin, shows how speculative design can stimulate reflection with alternative scenarios. The article in Tagesspiegel Magazine on Berlin Science Week 2025 »Beyond Now« is available in both English and German and can be accessed online.  → more

Achievements The Fondation Beyeler and the Chanel Culture Fund have appointed Cluster Researcher Rahel Kesselring as the first-ever Chanel Botanical Curator, establishing a new model for how museums engage with their natural surroundings and elevating nature to part of the museum’s collection. Congratulations, dear Rahel! Click here for coverage on CNN and ArtNews. → more

Possibly for the last time in this constellation, the seven Berlin Clusters of Excellence hosted a spectacular Science Slam on November 6th. For »Matters of Activity«, our members Yoonha Kim and Rasa Weber took to the stage and provided some spine-tingling moments. While anthropologist Yoonha Kim explained why »Wearing different clothes is a revolutionary act,« experimental designer, researcher, and diver Rasa Weber took us on a journey into »What the Reef? A joint dive into underwater design research.« Congratulations to the beaming winner from UniSysCat, Anushka Ghosh, with »Who Let the Hemes out? Who? Who? Who?«!

Publications Humans are drawn to patterns and hierarchies in nature, mimicking them particularly in decoration and architecture. Natural patterns, however, are never purely esthetic and, since evolution works on a variety of factors simultaneously, natural structural systems are intrinsically multifunctional. In order to understand the roles that structural patterns play in biology, we need to catalog and encapsulate the diversity of examples and the materials involved. In this paper, Jana Ciecierska-Holmes, Nikolai Rosenthal, Jan Wölfer, Felix Rasehorn, Binru Yang, Mai-Lee Van Le, Lennart Eigen, John Nyakatura, and Mason Dean provide a first classification of biological »tilings«, tessellated natural architectures that involve the repeated pattern of geometric, discrete elements bound by a joint material.  → more

Achievements | Robotics Understanding evolution through simulations and bio-inspired robots — that is the goal of robot-assisted paleontology. John Nyakatura, Professor of Comparative Zoology at the Institute of Biology at Humboldt Universität zu Berlin and Principal Investigator at »Matters of Activity«, wants to use these methods to understand the changes in the musculoskeletal system during the mammalian revolution. The German Research Foundation (DFG) has now announced that it will fund Nyakatura’s project »Robotic Paleontology: A New Key to Understanding the Early Evolution of Mammals« for five years starting in 2026 as part of its Reinhart Koselleck Projects program. We warmly congratulate John on this award! → more

At the invitation of Andreas Beitin, director of the Kunstmuseum Wolfsburg, and Sebastian Mühl, curator of the Utopia exhibition, who gave a lecture on the exhibition concept at the Cluster’s Brown Bag Brunch in March, a group of nearly 20 MoA members visited the Kunstmuseum Wolfsburg last week. During a detailed tour led by the curatorial team – Andreas Beitin, Sebastian Mühl, and Dino Steinhof – various aspects of curation and the themes on display were discussed. The magnificent exhibition »Utopia. The Right to Hope« can be visited until January 11th, 2026. An accompanying symposium will take place at the Berlin Academy of Arts on December 13th. ↗ more

Am 29. November 2025 laden das ZK/U Berlin – Zentrum für Kunst und Urbanistik und das von MoA Associated Member Nina Samuel geleitete Knowledge Exchange Office der Berlin University Alliance im Rahmen der Reihe »On Water Parcours« zu einem ganztägigen Programm ein, das Kunst, Wissenschaft und Stadtgesellschaft in den Dialog über Klimaanpassung und Resilienz bringt. Das Programm widmet sich der Frage, wie künstlerische und wissenschaftliche Praktiken dazu beitragen können, Städte widerstandsfähiger gegenüber Hitze, Dürre und veränderten Wasserzyklen zu gestalten. Der Tag markiert zugleich den Abschluss des dreijährigen Projekts ClimArt und die Eröffnung eines neuen künstlerischen Parcours, der auf dem Gelände des ZK/U und im angrenzenden Stadtgarten künstlerische Perspektiven auf die folgenden des urbanen Klimawandels erfahrbar macht. Mehr Details zum Programm finden sich ↗ hier. Zur Anmeldung geht es ↗ hier.

Achievements In November and December 2025, Alena Trapp, Jann Mausen, and Cluster Member Maja Avnat will be guest researchers at Tieranatomisches Theater (TA T) for the program »anatomia publica« – Open Stage for Scientific, Aesthetic and Social Research Practices, curated by Paz Ponce (TA T). As part of the interdisciplinary network »Kontaminiert Werden«, they explore urban ecologies and more-than-human social relations. From 10–13 December 2025, the public is invited to visit the open temporary laboratory and participate in knowledge exchange events. For example, research findings and ecological field methods such as »Bioblitz« will be discussed in cooperation with the Späth-Arboretum (Anika Dreilich), combining artistic, cultural, and scientific perspectives on urban ecologies. → more

Publications | Sand Congratulations to Cluster Member Michaela Büsse on her new edited volume! »Granular Configurations: Sand, Materiality, and Planetary Urbanization« explores the world’s most used — yet often overlooked — building material: sand. Bringing together voices from geography, geology, social sciences, art, and the humanities, the book traces how sand moves and transforms, resisting easy capture by political and ecological systems. From extractive practices and colonial legacies to fragile infrastructures and grassroots struggles, sand emerges here not just as a resource, but as an unstable force shaping the planetary urban condition. Don’t miss the book launch on January 16th, 2026, 7 pm at Pro qm! → more