The exhibition “Politics of Design – Per/Forming Critique“ displays critical design and performative works developed in the framework of parallel collaborative studio classes by ECDF Professor Michelle Christensen (ECDF/TU Berlin) and ECDF Professor Florian Conradi (ECDF/FU Berlin) during the summer semester of 2025. The exhibition is on display until the end of October 2025 at the ECDF. Interested visitors can register for a viewing via //e-mail with Friedrich Schmidgall.
In a state of ontological crisis, all boundaries between human and machine, nature and culture, and the organic and inorganic have been severely blurred. We find ourselves exhaustively tackling the turmoil of our own designed circumstances, as we emerge to become extensions of the extensions that we have built. These are times of curious contrivances, novel natures, inescapable automation, and posthuman performances – where human and nonhuman entities become entwined, meshed, and muddled into new, unwitting entanglements. But from biased machine learning to surveillance capitalism and digital colonialism – what power structures are implicitly and covertly being embedded into these technologies? Do we need to initiate a discussion about political systems of things – about ubiquitous capitalism, algorithmic aristocracy, or object-mediated democracy?
The exhibition showcases works by students from Freie Universität Berlin, Technische Universität Berlin, Berlin University of the Arts, and Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin: Viktoria Adolf, Willi Beeskow, Laura Bouget, Sophie Borgmeyer, Rosa Burr, Phillip Büchner, Gina Chamizer, Hümeyra Demırcıoglu, Maulana Fawwaz, Lukas Helling, Johannes Hofmeister, Natalia Iberra, Clara Isakowitsch, Inka Jehs, Anna Job, Pauline Jacob, Jessica Kakmeni, Nastasia Last, Robert Lange, Yunseo Lee, Marlina Metz, Seyed Naghavialhosseini, Levi Puig, Philipp Proff, Kallum Robinson, Annabelle Riechert, Eva Rziha, Sophie Scholl, Rebekka Schmitt, Sophie Stein, Natalie Stadtkowski, Emma Steiniger, Ann-Marie La Vitola, Valentina Weinreich & Grace Zang.