Ecological Entanglements across Collections - Plant Lives and Beyond - Day 3

The interdisciplinary 4A Lab Academy, "Ecological Entanglements across Collections – Plant Lives and Beyond," takes place from 4–8 November 2024, in collaboration with the Stiftung Preußischer Kulturbesitz. The Academy builds on the ecocritical turn in the humanities and explores the role of plant life in artistic and aesthetic practices, human knowledge production, and theoretical critical thinking across histories, communities, and geographies. Through a series of panels, lectures, workshops, collection visits, and performances, the Academy invites participants to collectively (re)think human entanglements with vegetal and non-human life, in dialogue with the collections of the SPK.

Day three is dedicated to the nexus of Vegetability, Power and Resistance in and across Asia 1600-1850, as Paradise Drama. Here, scholars discuss the making of gardens as religious, spiritual, and power structures, in search of resilience, with a special session dedicated on the collections of the Oriental Department of the Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin.

Wednesday, 6 November 2024

Simón Bolívar Lecture Hall, Ibero-Amerikanisches Institut/Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin

PANEL II

Paradise Drama: Vegetability, Power and Resistance in Safavid Isfahan, Qing Kangxi, and Pre/Colonial Awadh

CHAIR

Sinem Casale (Kunsthistorisches Institut in Florenz, MPI/University of Michigan)

9. 45

Mahroo Moosavi (4A_Lab)

Isfahan through the Safavid Prose and Verse Shahr-āshūb(s): From I‘jāz-i Hiravī’s Rāgh to Vaḥīd-i Qazvīnī’s Bāgh 

RESPONDENT

Sussan Babaie (The Courtauld Institute of Art, London)

CHAIR

Margrit Pernau (Max Planck Institute for Human Development, Berlin)

10. 45

Parul Singh (4A_Lab)

Contested Paradises: Aesthetics of Order and Morality in Nawabi and Colonial Gardens in Lucknow in the 19th Century 

RESPONDENT

Sunil Khilnani (Ashoka University, Sonipat)

11. 45 Coffee Break

CHAIR

Sinem Casale (Kunsthistorisches Institut in Florenz, MPI/University of Michigan)

12. 00

Feng Schöneweiß (4A_Lab)

The Depth of Surface. The Ecologies of Lacquer from Late Imperial China to Contemporary Berlin

RESPONDENTS

Birgitta Augustin (Curator, Museum für Asiatische Kunst, Berlin)

Wenyi Qian (Kunsthistorisches Institut in Florenz, MPI)

13. 00 Lunch Break             

14. 00

VISIT - participants pnly

Oriental Department, Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin, Dietrich-Bonhoeffer Hall

Presentation by Christoph Rauch (Head, Oriental Department, Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin)

Introduction to the Collection of Persian Manuscripts at the Oriental Department

Collection workshop with Christoph Rauch, Mahroo Moosavi (4A_Lab), and Parul Singh (4A_Lab)

Persianate Compilations of the 16th and 17th Centuries: The Berlin State Library's Treasures 

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15. 00

SAMMLUNGSBESUCH auf Deutsch *

Geschwungene Schriften und filigrane Miniaturen: Einführung in die Sammlung persischer Handschriften der Orientabteilung

Geleitet von CHRISTOPH RAUCH (Leiter der Orientabteilung, Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin)

Ort: Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin,  Dietrich-Bonhoeffer-Saal,  Potsdamer Str. 33, 10785 Berlin

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15. 30 Coffee Break

LECTURES

Simón Bolívar Lecture Hall, Ibero-Amerikanisches Institut 

16. 00 

Stefan Weber (Director, Museum für Islamische Kunst, Berlin) – remote 

More than Ornament: Gardens, Scents, and Plants in the New Display of the Museum of Islamic Art

Moderation and Discussion: Sinem Casale (Kunsthistorisches Institut in Florenz, MPI/University of Michigan)

16. 45

Sussan Babaie (The Courtauld Institute of Art, London)

Plant Sense. Why do Nomads need Gardens?

Moderation and Discussion: Christoph Rauch (Oriental Department, Staatsbibliothek zu Berlin)

17. 45

Sunil Khilnani (Ashoka University, Sonipat)

The Indian Cosmopolis

Moderation and Discussion: Margrit Pernau (Max Planck Institute for Human Development, Berlin)

The international Research and Fellowship Program "4A Lab: Art Histories, Archaeologies, Anthropologies, Aesthetics" is a cooperation between the Kunsthistorisches Institut in Florenz – Max-Planck-Institut and the Stiftung Preußischer Kulturbesitz.