EVA BERLIN CONFERENCE 2027

Electronic Media and Visual Arts

30^th Edition: 21 – 23 April 2027

 

www.eva-berlin-conference.de

 

Living Intelligence. 
Creativity Between Matter, Memory and Machine

 

CALL FOR CONTRIBUTIONS | ANNOUNCEMENT | SAVE THE DATE 

 

The EVA Berlin Conference addresses the transformations underway across the cultural heritage, creative industries, and memory institutions in the context of accelerating digitalisation. Building on a continuous history dating back to 1994 and following its successful relaunch in 2023, the conference reaches a significant milestone with its 30th edition.

 

The growing convergence of digital technologies and artificial intelligence is fundamentally reshaping numerous fields and exerting profound influence on contemporary society. Generative AI tools, intelligent agents and assistants, hybrid experiential spaces, immersive XR technologies, and participatory interaction ecologies are among the defining developments of this moment — each demanding both technical rigour and speculative inquiry, and raising critical questions around inclusivity, sustainability, and societal impact. Alongside these developments, renewed attention to materiality, craft, and the biography of artworks in digital environments is reshaping how cultural heritage is created, preserved, and transmitted.

 

Contributions reporting on ongoing projects, completed research, and emerging practice are welcomed for the forthcoming edition. As part of the international EVA conference network — with established events in London, Florence, and Paris — the Berlin edition serves as a platform for sustained international and European exchange.

 

Brandenburg University of Technology Cottbus-Senftenberg (BTU), the Fraunhofer Heinrich-Hertz-Institut (HHI), and the Gesellschaft von Freunden des Heinrich-Hertz-Instituts e.V. invite submissions of contribution proposals as well as expressions of interest in cooperation, addressing but not limited to the following topics:

 

Topics

 

AI and Human Creativity: Negotiating Imperfection and Authorship

 

• AI-generated content and the limits of synthesis
• Image and video generation across scientific, artistic and architectural contexts
• Crypto art, net art and algorithmic systems
• Algorithmic art forms and computational creativity
• Redefining authorship: human agency, imperfection and co-creation in AI-driven contexts

 

Digital Infrastructure, Standards and Sustainable Heritage

 

• Open access to cultural heritage as precondition for tracing artwork biographies across institutions
• Visualising artwork biographies: circulation, reception and digital afterlives
• Metadata standardisation, interoperability and FAIR principles
• Virtual exhibitions, immersive tours and the digital presence of cultural heritage

 

Participatory Systems and Psychological Depth

 

• Audience-artwork interaction dynamics and affective engagement
• Gamification, play-based approaches and interactive mediation formats
• Hybrid realities, spatial installations and mixed-media environments
• Participatory research and digital inclusion frameworks

 

Technology Ethics and Cultural Futures

 

• Identity formation and self-representation in digital ecosystems
• Ownership, privacy and surveillance in art-tech spaces
• Blockchain-based provenance tracking and authentication in cultural collections
• Climate crisis and technology’s role in sustainable art production
• Risks of digital life: uncertainty, resilience and algorithmic governance

 

Materiality, Sustainability and Digital Preservation

 

• Optical, kinetic and programmed art systems with emphasis on material presence
• Conservation of software-based and born-digital art: preserving artwork lives and reproduction histories
• Net art, interactive design and art-historical storytelling through multimodal platforms
• Light, sound and algorithmic experimentation
• Tactile and craft-based practices intersecting with digital systems

 

Emerging Intelligences: From Brain-Computer Interfaces to Biomimetic Systems

 

• AI-driven artwork interpretation, biography reconstruction and curatorial tools
• Brain-computer interfaces and autonomous robotics
• Biomimicry, living systems and bio-digital hybrid art
• Social prescribing, community well-being and therapeutic applications of art

 

Art Education and Mediation

 

• Visual languages, narrative design and knowledge dissemination
• Digital pedagogy and adaptive learning formats
• Art practice and mediation in augmented and hybrid realities
• Museums as laboratories for societal innovation and cultural futures

 

Political and Aesthetic Discourse

 

• Socio-political narratives in digital art practice
• Interfacing analogue and digital expressive forms
• Politics of online mediation and algorithmic bias

 

 

Lectures

 

Proposals for papers addressing the conference topics are invited from researchers, practitioners and scholars across relevant disciplines

 

 

Exhibition / company presentations

 

Submissions are welcomed for presentations, project showcases, posters and new product demonstrations as part of the accompanying exhibition

 

 

Proceedings

 

Contributions by accepted speakers and exhibitors will be published in the conference proceedings via Artbooks (arthistoricum.net). Each individual contribution will be assigned a persistent Digital Object Identifier (DOI).

 

 

Venue

 

Fraunhofer Heinrich-Hertz-Institut (Fraunhofer HHI)
10857 Berlin

 

Important dates

 

– 19 July 2026 (DEADLINE EXTENDED): Abstract and CV submission

– 3 August 2026: Notification of abstract acceptance

– 12 October 2026: Full paper submission

– 9 November 2026: Notification of paper acceptance

 

 

Registration

 

Please register via Eventbrite. Early bird rate (until Dec 20): EUR 280 + fees. Standard price: EUR 350 + fees.

 

 

Submission

 

Please submit abstracts and brief biographical notes (up to 300 words each) for paper presentations and/or exhibition contributions via EasyChair by 19 July 2026 (DEADLINE EXTENDED).