Curated by: Joanna Warsza and Patricia Reed
With: José Luis Chicoma, Uwe Fleckner, Gastón Gurlekian, Sujatro Ghosh, Shahira Issa, KITE, Raqs Media Collective, Bill Sherman, artists and the public.
Open and free to All.
Registration is requested. Please contact us at info@stadtkuratorin-hamburg.de
Please note that the symposium takes place in English without translation.
On the occasion of the first public art exhibition by Hamburg City Curator, which takes place at the Stadtpark and in the Planetarium Hamburg, and includes the recreation of Aby Warburg’s Image Collection on the History of Astrology and Astronomy, the symposium explores the everlasting human impulse to look up to the sky, in order to make sense of our place on Earth. In a mixture of readings, performances, theory and culinary experiments, we will explore how art mediates various meanings of planetarity, in political, scientific and mythological terms. We traverse the entanglements between a grain of sand, the bacteria in our gut, rare earth minerals inside our phones and the history of Islamic astrology and astronomy. These various inputs enable the imagination of planetary publicness, as a vista of orientation beyond Earthly extraction and exploitation.
The Rhythm of the Day:
The talks, performances and conversations are interwoven by three acts of Sacred Cosmogram Menu, a culinary work by artist and activist Sujatro Ghosh where Warburgian cosmology meets diasporic hospitality.
12:00-12:20 Welcome into the day Sacred Cosmogram Act I: Helios Twins — Zaatar Boat Pairings: Tomato & Sesame – acidic warmth of dawn | Caramelised Onion – deepening morning shadow. Nebula Communion — Smoky Aubergine Spread. Fruit of the Morning: Orange
Cosmic References: The Solar Barge—ancient vessels that carry the sun across the sky, as in Egyptian cosmology and Warburg's notes on astral navigation and his fascination with the Nachleben (afterlives) of motifs finds its echo in those boats that hold sustenance, myths, goods and resources that travel across cultures, often asymmetrically.
Paired drink Solar Zest: Twinkling Citrus Sweetness, drinking in the dimming of stars as daybreak takes hold.
12:20-12:30 Joanna Warsza | Introduction and Welcome
From the Cosmos and the Commons, Five Elements.
12:30 Uwe Fleckner | Aby Warburg’s Image Collection on the History of Astrology and Astronomy
On the history of Aby Warburg’s last, and lost exhibition and its resonance for orientation today. Warburg, together with his collaborators Gertrud Bing and Fritz Saxl, had designed this didactic exhibition for the opening of the Planetarium Hamburg in 1930; his only residual heritage that remained in Hamburg, and which had been considered lost since the 60’s. It was not until 1987 that Uwe Fleckner, then a student of art history, discovered the “hidden treasure” in the planetarium: 66 picture-panels and artifacts that were awaiting disposal in a pile of bulky waste.ed to look up to the sky to make sense of our place on Earth
13:00-13:30 Raqs Media Collective | The Necessity of Infinity
A Lecture-Performance
Based on a neglected, intellectual exchange between Al Beruni and Ibn Sina on Aristotle’s understanding of heaven and the stars, that took place via remote correspondence in 999 (CE) for two years. By speculating about the future of evolution of the human species and the possibility of exploring other worlds, Raqs gestures to the presence of infinity in our lives.
13:30-14:00 KITE | Dreaming with AI
On the teachings of indigenous cosmologies upon ethical computation.
The core of Kite’s practice focuses also on how the Lakȟóta philosophies can influence the artificial intelligence, how to create an ethical and just computational media towards a better and less exploitative and predatory systems of human communication, orientation and data use.
Moderation: Patricia Reed
14:00-14:30 Gastón Gurlekian and Bill Sherman (Director of the Warburg Institute London), on the ellipse as architectural agent and card decks as Bilderfahzeuge and Gastón Gurlekian (Museo Xul Solar, Buenos Aires) on Xul Solar cosmos and his Tarot as a predictive instrument. Followed by a conversation.
14:30-15:00 Break with Sacred Cosmogram Act II: A mercurial time - the finger snacks, which mirror flux, dispersal, economy and politics, like wandering images of Mnemosyne atlas. Nomadic Ovals — Mushroom Kibbeh Boats, Comet Shells — Beetroot & Aloo Phuchka, Beetroot Tahini Filling | Spiced Fried Potato Crunch Filling.
Fruit of the Afternoon: Strawberry, Paired drink Mercurial Drift: Astral Kombu Tidal Currents Cosmic References: Regional algae captures the salty sea, as we swallow the memory of Oceanic forces of this rootless plant, which is offering a potential for the nutrition of tomorrow. The metabolic act of eating is a relational gesture to our environment, one that we quite literally digest, and that passes through us.
15:00 Welcome back: Joanna Warsza and Patricia Reed | Weaving Threads
15:10-15:40 José Luis Chicoma
On Food Systems and the Commons: From the Peruvian anchovy to the Nordic salmon
José Luis serves as Senior Advisor on Global Food Systems for the United Nations Development Program (UNDP), he served as a Minister of Production (2020-2021) and Vice Minister of Micro and Small Enterprises and Industry (2009-2010) of the Republic of Peru. At THE NEW INSTITUTE in Hamburg, José Luis is involved as Chair of the program The Future of Food: Power and Biodiversity in the Academic Year 2024/25.
Moderation: Patricia Reed
15:40-16:20 From the Cosmos to the Commons, Words/Worlds from Participating Artists Panel Discussion on reimagining cosmological orientation through artistic practice.
16:20-16:40 Patricia Reed | Planetary Perspectives
At the cusp of Planetary paradigm shift, we ask how is our human self-understanding transformed, and how may art serve as a medium to experience this shift from such otherworlds of thought? Closing notes.
16:40-17:00 Audience Questions/Reflections and Discussion Among Guests
17:00-17:30 Sacred Cosmogram Menu, Act III As the afternoon embraces, taste bends toward the mystical. Here, moon-touched flavours evoke introspection, ending with sweetness-echoing shared meals from Aleppo to Calcutta, like the Mnemosyne Atlas with its final plates turning toward myth, the body and the sky.
Saturn’s Ember — Itch Ovals, Lunar Bloom — Katayef with Gulab Jamun
Paired drink Lunar Solstice: Hibiscus Ember Infusion
Fruit of the early evening: Fig Sonically
Accompanied by a playlist by Shahira Issa
