BioLab

The AKI BioLab brings art and science together. It’s a place where you can perform hands-on research on ecology, materials and systems by cultivating and experimenting with living materials. But BioLab goes beyond research. As a creative workshop, it lets you actively transform theory into practice.

Here’s what you can do

Experiment with organic materials: working with plants, bacteria, fungi, algae
Use scientific equipment and methodologies for art and design
Perform multidisciplinary research in ecology, philosophy, bioethics and biohacking
Reflect on responsibility and accountability: from ethical issues relating to living materials to ecocritical understanding of social and cultural implications
Experiment and reclaim forgotten tools and perceptions: fermentation, natural dyes, scent

BioMatters program

An artistic research programme open to all students in their second year or above
Lasts one or two semesters and features lectures and practical sessions
Topics include: rethinking the anthropocentrism; rethinking the notion of life and death, matters of scale, slow violence and toxicants, biohacking human; living and dying photography; the alchemy of vision and more than human gaze.

The programme is led by Dr. Agnieszka Anna Wołodźko, who has a background in philosophy of art, art and science relations, posthumanism and new materialism. The programme invites various international artists and designers as guest teachers. Previous guest artists and designers were Raphael Kim, Aniela Hoitink, Sonja Bäumel, Zeger Reyers, Špela Petrič, Adam Zaretsky, Pei-Ying Lin, Christine van der Heide, Adriana Knouf, Roland van Dierendonck, Maro Pebo, Merle Bergers, Helena Sanders, Karolina Żyniewicz.