MULTISPECIES ASSEMBLY

Sunday, 06 September 2026 | 10:00–20:00
Floating University Berlin
Free · In English · Open to all

Over the course of two years, On Water. Parcours has traced Berlin’s water knowledge and waterscapes through artistic research, scientific inquiry and collective exploration. Bringing together artists, researchers, practitioners and the wider public, the programme has explored how collaborative practices can deepen our relationships with the waters that shape the city. At Floating University Berlin, this journey reaches its culmination in the Multispecies Assembly, a joint closing event with the fourth and final day of the Confluence of European Water Bodies 2026.

By uniting these two initiatives, Multispecies Assembly brings a long-term exploration of Berlin's waters into dialogue with four days of exchange among Europe’s water communities. The event is both a celebration and an invitation: to continue cultivating relationships of care and reciprocity with the waters that sustain us beyond the festival itself. Together, these two journeys – one rooted in Berlin's waters, the other spanning more than forty European water bodies – come together to celebrate the relationships that have taken shape while opening new pathways for collaboration across watersheds, disciplines and species. They leave us with a shared commitment to imagine – and practise – new forms of responsibility, coexistence and river citizenship.

Multispecies Assembly invites participants to experience aquatic ecosystems as living commons that transcend disciplinary, territorial and species boundaries. At a time when rivers are increasingly fragmented by extractivism, pollution, and infrastructural control, the event poses the question of what it would mean to reimagine rivers as living beings, both in our imaginations and legal systems. How might this shift transform the ways in which we govern, care for, and live alongside rivers? And how can more-than-human worlds participate in democratic decision-making?

The day begins with a series of participatory workshops inviting visitors to encounter water bodies not only as a resource or landscape, but as a medium that connects atmospheres, plants, bodies, voices and multispecies worlds. Through different sensory and artistic practices, participants can explore atmospheric commons atmospheric commons by working with water, soil and air as shared media of ecological imagination, compose a collective River Song inspired by the voices, memories and rhythms of flowing waters, or discover riverside ecologies through a guided tasting of wild teas that traces stories of exchange between plants, bodies and waterways. In the afternoon, the Assembly culminates in Berlin's first Spree Species Council, a participatory performance by Organismendemokratie in which participants take on the perspectives of more than 150 species inhabiting the Spree ecosystem to collectively deliberate and vote on proposals for the river's future. Throughout the day, the Living Infrastructure exhibition traces the transformation of Floating University Berlin from a technical rainwater infrastructure into a natureculture learning site, while shared meals and informal encounters create space for exchange between members of the European Water Bodies network, artists, researchers and the wider public.Together, these practices invite us to imagine forms of democracy and coexistence that transcend the human realm.

Admission is free*.

*A note on no-shows and registration: Participation is free, but places are limited. By registering, you reserve a place that cannot easily be offered to someone else if you do not attend. We therefore kindly ask you to register only if you genuinely expect to join us. Thank you for helping us make this day accessible to as many people as possible.

The event takes place in English language.

For more information about the full Confluence program visit: symbiotic-lab.com/confluence-berlin-2026

This event is embedded into the Confluence of European Water Bodies 2026. From 3–6 September 2026, the River Spree hosts the fourth edition of this international water gathering in Berlin. For four days, over 40 rivers, lakes, lagoons, glaciers, seas, and wetlands from across Europe gather to explore how we can live with water differently. For more information about Floating University Berlin visit:  https://floating-berlin.org/ 

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DETAILED PROGRAM

10 AM - 1 PM  : Participatory Workshops (limited capacity)

Language: English, with possible spontaneous translation to German

 

10:30 AM - 1 PM Per-Forming Atmospheric Commons - Clemens Winkler, Humboldt University & Matters of Activity

A participatory workshop that brings water, soil, and air samples into relation as speculative materials for sensing atmospheric commons and questioning care, coexistence, responsibility, and river citizenship.

Per-Forming Atmospheric Commons explores air, water, and aerosols as shared media connecting bodies, infrastructures, plants, rivers, weather, and more-than-human life. Starting from the Floating University basin and nearby waterways, participants observe and compare water, soil, and air samples, then transform their observations into situated atmospheric imaginaries through mist, sensing, and movement. Once turned into mist, the samples become speculative assemblages of sediments, sweat, tyre abrasion, and other residues of multispecies cohabitation. Because such mixtures often escape perception, they open a shared space for sensing, imagining, and questioning. Together we map atmospheric commons and ask how local atmospheres resonate with wider landscapes. The session culminates in Atmospheric Commons Declarations that question care, responsibility, coexistence, and river citizenship.

Key words: #atmosphericcommons #rightsofthespree #multispeciesmapping #speculativematerials #performingclouds #aerosols #situatedsensing #collectivesampling #rivercitizenship #morethanhuman #re_enchantingcommons #waterbodies #atmosphericimaginaries #commons

Clemens Winkler is a designer, artist, and researcher based in Berlin. He works internationally across art, design, science, and education, developing experimental formats for exhibitions, workshops, teaching, and artistic research. He is affiliated with the Cluster of Excellence Matters of Activity at Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin and runs the Laboratory for Narrative Materials.

https://clemenswinkler.com

instagram: clemens__winkler

Take away: A heightened sensitivity to water, air, soil, and aerosols as shared, living media that connect bodies, infrastructures, rivers, weather, and more-than-human life. Approaching otherwise abstract environmental issues as situated relations of care, vulnerability, responsibility, and coexistence.

 

10 AM - 1 PM River Song Workshop - Alessandra Eramo

In the "River Song" participants explore vocal performance practices and listening, blending human and non-human voices inspired by the sound of the river.

River Song is an interdisciplinary workshop centred on the theme of rivers. Drawing inspiration from the sound of water and the metaphorical dimension of rivers, the workshop invites participants to explore the potential of the voice as an expressive medium. The voice is ephemeral yet deeply embodied, through extended vocal techniques, the voice can be transformed and unfold in unexpected forms. A central focus of the workshop is the concept of ecological memory: a river carries the memory of floods and droughts in its rocks, sounds, and stories. Through singing, graphic scores, text and mimetic practices, we will create a choir that flows like a river - soft, loud, still, moving - blurring the boundaries between human voices and environmental sounds, whether real, imagined or remembered. The workshop will conclude with a choral performance open to the public.

Key words: #vocalperformanceart #listening #river# soundart #ecologicalmemory #choir    

Alessandra Eramo is a sound artist, vocalist, performer-composer based in Berlin. Her  practice spans performance, installation, sound poetry, video, and drawing, exploring the latent acoustic territories of the voice and noise as a socio-political matter. Widely acclaimed for her distinctive voice art, she has exhibited and performed internationally at festivals, museums, art spaces and on radio. https://ezramo.com/

https://www.instagram.com/alessandra_eramo/

Take away: Participants are invited to develop a deeper understanding of the voice as an expressive medium, adopt new listening practices and experience collective vocal creation in relation to rivers and environmental sounds.

 

11 AM - 1 PM Metamorphic membranes - A wild tea tasting - Cholena  de Koningh with scientific support by Selina Tenzer

A guided tasting of wild teas made from riverside plants, where stories of ecological exchange reveal how, like a river, we absorb and are transformed by what flows through us.

Rivers carry more than water; tea carries more than taste. This tasting invites participants to drink wild, oxidised teas made from plants that grow along rivers. With each cup, we introduce the plant and it's key characteristics, the oxidation process behind its aroma and flavour, and the ecology that ties it to the river, affirming its right to grow there. Like a river, we absorb our surroundings, and are changed by what flows through us. Each tea is a small act of that exchange: the plant's nutrients become part of our body, its flavours activate emotions, and its story adapts our way of thinking. We close the tasting and talk by collectively bruising fresh plant leaves, breaking their cell walls to activate oxidation, the start of the transformation behind every tea you just tasted.

Key Words

#HumanPlantRelation #SensoryStorytelling #WildTeaTasting #WildFermentation

Cholena de Koningh is an artist and forager who collaborates with chefs, scientists, and other artists to connect people with nature through wild food. What began as curiosity about common weeds grew into a devotion to studying edible flora and fungi, a passion she now shares with others, helping them build a closer, wilder relationship with the nature around them.

www.feistyforagers.com

https://www.instagram.com/feisty.forager/

Selina Tenzer is an Agricultural Research Associate in the Forest Forest Systems project (Waldgartensysteme, WASYS) funded by the German Federal Agency for Nature Conservation, Project Manager of the INTEGRA project and the Food Forest Seminar Series, Food Forest Consultant, as part of the STATTwerke e.V.. She is trained in soil science, where biology, physics and chemistry converge. Passionate about land use and the question how plants feed humans, she also works as a freelance environmental educator specializing in soil science for Weltacker Berlin e.V..

Take away: By taking the time to observe, as well as absorb the tea, participants will experience a change similar to how the plant cells were changed by the tea-making process, one that leaves them curious about these plants and the ecosystems they are part of.

 

2 PM - 5 PM Spree Species Council - A Multispecies Assembly & Preference Voting (limited capacity)

Multispecies Assembly with Species Representatives

What if not only humans had political rights, but if all species were included in administrative and political decision making? The participatory performance by the artist group Club Real is an invitation to a change of perspective: The river Spree is a multi species society. All participants of the performance take on the role of a species currently present in the Spree. To enable this Club Real works with scientists compiling lists of living creatures. Eel and bitterling, mitten crab and zebra mussel, cyanobacterium or water lily - more than 150 species representatives will debate current challenges of the spree ecosystem. Together they will vote which of the 4 presented initiatives has the biggest potential to support necessary transformations. It is possible to participate in the performance with no prior knowledge - just show up and dive into a multi species performative experiment.

Key words: #multispeciesassembly #organismsdemocracy #morethanhuman #preferencevoting

The artists group Club Real is devising and realising participatory site-specific projects: Installations, one-to-one encounters, political role play scenarios and participatory urban development projects invite visitors to help shape alternative concepts of reality. Since 2017 they are working with multi species scenarios and the participatory political practice Organisms Democracy.

https://organismendemokratie.org/

https://www.clubreal.de/

instagram.com/organismsdemocracy

Partly English

Younger participants (10 years and older) can participate together with an older person  

5 PM - 6 PM Official Closing of On Water. Parcours and Confluence of European Water Bodies

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Curatorial, Design & Research Lead of the Confluence of European Water Bodies
Léon Gross & Jakob Kukula
Symbiotic Lab

Curatorial Lead of the Final Day
Dr. Nina Samuel, Sina Ribak & Tuçe Erel
On Water. Parcours, Berlin University Alliance

In partnership with
Global Alliance for the Rights of Nature (GARN) · Organismendemokratie e.V. · buero gross · River Collective · Polisphere · SpreeBerlin · Theresa Maria Forthaus (Photo & Video) · Freddy Adelmann (Graphic Design)