Guiding Principles

OUR RESEARCH CONCERNS

Our guiding questions & concerns

• How can artistic, cultural and research practices foster social change and cultural sustainability for a more just, livable future?
• How to create open and inclusive spaces with communities in rural and urban contexts?

Focus

• cultural sustainability & socio-ecological transformation: sustainability as a social practice, and as a principle of action encompassing all areas of life and society
• democracy & justice: participatory arts and cultural production as part of a plural society
• co-creative processes: developing ideas and creating knowledge together by combining theory and practice
• everyday realities & diversity: multi-perspective, inclusive and low-barrier approaches oriented towards people’s lived realities

Forms of working

• creating open spaces: developing and designing spaces for communication, education and action
• transdisciplinary: collaborative action of various social groups including a variety of disciplines and artforms, research, cultural work, and cultural production
• participatory: researchers, lecturers and artists develop ideas together with the civil society
• artistic approaches: social engagement, scrutinizing knowledge, and emerging practices – with formats such as storytelling, comics, creative writing, DIY practices, games and performances
• international & solidarity: embracing global perspectives of arts and research

Our Approach & Goals

transdisciplinary collaboration – creating open spaces of experimentation – sustainable transformation

Today’s complex challenges require joint action. This is why we, the focus area Society & Sustainability, have set ourselves the task of bringing together the concerns of different social groups, academic disciplines, and artistic and cultural fields of practice. Our aim is to enable a socio-critical examination of current issues and to explore forms of change together.
On this basis, we set artistic, cultural and academic practices in motion with the objective of concrete change.
We consider academic knowledge, cultural production and the arts as transformative forces that need to be interwoven on equal terms. Therefore, it is vital to carefully utilize their social and cultural possibilities to achieve sustainable effects. This understanding of transdisciplinary collaboration guides us to create open, empowering and critical spaces of communication and experimentation. Counteracting social inequalities and having a productive impact on conflict-driven conversations about democracy and the climate crisis is fundamental to our actions.
Our transdisciplinary research, critical reflection and co-creative practices are also in line with the UN’s 17 Sustainable Development Goals.

Our working methods & subject areas

co-creative and process-oriented – critical and participatory – everyday realities and fictional practices – socially engaged

We associate the arts and culture with a process of social negotiation. We understand the arts and cultural production as something that is developed and explored on a societal, social, ecological and economic level together with society and across various disciplines. As social groups, artists and scholars, we develop project ideas along joint interests to further shape a sustainable society. In our focus area Society & Sustainability, we focus on co-creative processes that critically question existing forms of knowledge and that develop new forms of knowledge on socially relevant topics. The formats we work with include storytelling, DIY practices, comics, creative writing, games, performances and other participatory and critical practices. We explore practices that are oriented towards lived realities and everyday contexts, including socially engaged arts and cultural work with a focus on cultural participation, democratic principles and planetary justice.

Cultural sustainability, eco-social transformation and diversity are aspects that we take into account as cross-cutting issues in all our areas of work and fields of activity. In view of global challenges that are having an even greater impact on local conditions, we build on international cooperation and transnational solidarity.

Our core understanding & perspectives

cultures of agency – diversity – continuous reflection – commoning – sustainable artistic and cultural practices

In our working methods, we endeavour to consider diversity not only as an integral component, but also to put it into practice. This leads us to multi-perspective approaches in research, teaching and mediation. We take diversity into account when appointing lecturers and guest speakers, as well as in diversity-sensitive recruiting processes. Our focus further includes an inclusive and accessible design of our teaching and outreach programs as well as project profiles that enable a comprehensive participation of diverse social groups.

In our focus area Society & Sustainability, we continuously reflect on forms of communication, spaces for action and the design of our working practices in dialogue groups. We are guided by the need to reflect on mechanisms of inclusion and exclusion, and to strengthen the presence and possible effects of voices and expertise that are not sufficiently represented in academic and artistic institutions. In addition, we value the principle of commoning, collaborative action and sharing of resources, and we promote sustainable practices such as circular economy purchases, ecologically responsible travel activities and catering at events. We are aware of our structural responsibility as part of large institutions which goes hand in hand with an ecological handprint (and thus complements the individual footprint).