Transmediale 2019

Spatial Concept for Transmediale, Haus der Kulturen der Welt, Berlin, 2019

For the media festival Transmediale 2019, the exhibition hall of the iconic Haus der Kulturen der Welt was transformed into a platform for live events. Designed to accommodate a range of formats—performances, talks, concerts, and study group discussions—the space encouraged interaction, multiple perspectives, and a continual redefinition of the boundary between audience and performer.

All the building's lights were filtered through different shades of pink and red, giving the festival's theme of affective technologies a spatial and visceral dimension. In old English the color pink was called “incarnation”, from the Latin word for „flesh“, describing hues between „flesh-color, blush-color“ to „crimson, blood color“. To incarnate, as a verb, also meant "to take the shape of flesh" - today it means to embody, to manifest something, an idea, into a concrete form or a human body.

The "Study Circle Library," accompanying the festival, was a reading room with a curated selection of books spanning theory, poetry, and fiction—all relevant to the festival’s theme. Translucent curtains veiled the library from the rest of the event, creating an intimate yet permeable space. Instead of bookshelves, the books were attached to cushions filled with shredded remains of discarded books and old festival catalogs. These cushions provided both places to rest and soft repositories of repurposed knowledge.