SINNE – Awaken your Senses

Our five senses are our door to the world – yet what is happening beyond the limits of human perception? The BIOTOPIA natural history museum in Munich is organising a transdisciplinary festival entitled “SINNE” (SENSES) which aims to answer this and other questions concerning sensory perception. Perspectives from the natural sciences, art, music and design shed light on the (far more than) five senses, with which humans and other species are endowed. The programme also thematically explores how senses can be manipulated, our perception can be expanded, and the possibilities of creative sensory experience in music and art, for example.

The contributions by international artists will provide visitors a multisensory experience of the project’s natural scientific content. For example, visitors will be introduced to the scents of long-extinct plants in an installation by the artist Daisy Ginsberg and the olfactory art pioneer Sissel Tolaas using CRISPR genome editing. The objects created by the artist duo Anne Cleary and Denis Connolly will enable visitors to see the world through different eyes, namely the simulated visual apparatus of various animals. And performances based on the bird chirping app “Dawn Chorus” will encourage visitors to listen keenly. For example, the musicians Cosmo Sheldrake and Dominik Eulberg have teamed up on a project that intersects the fields of sound art and wildlife conservation.

SINNE will be staged at BIOTOPIA and other venues in Munich in October 2022. To ensure the accessibility to both experts and the general public, the admission-free festival will include classical educational events, installations and lectures, as well as science slams, hands-on activities, experiments, concerts, excursions and digital programmes. The festival programme will also be offered in English and in German sign language.

Festival director: Nina Möllers
Curatorial team: Anna-Lisa Dieter, Dora Dzvonyar, Nina Möllers
Participants: Guy Ben-Ary, Emmanuele Coccia, Anne Cleary & Denis Connolly, Ophelia Deroy, Dominik Eulberg, Alexandra Daisy Ginsberg, Jonathon Keats, Charles Spence, Philip Wiegard, Ed Yong

Festival: BIOTOPIA – Naturkundemuseum Bayern, Munich: 1–2 Oct. 2022