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We warmly invite you to join us on 19 March 2026 for a special program: At 4 pm, artist Neyen Pailamilla will present the performance Transplant: Healing in the Mapuche Diaspora in the Botanic Gardens Bonn. In Neyen’s work, plant knowledge becomes a lived, embodied, and spiritual process unfolding between humans, plants, bodies of water, […]

As Europe rethinks its foreign policy amidst shifting global political relations, one question remains central: Can cooperation succeed without confronting colonial history? This panel takes Germany’s first genocide of the 20th century in Namibia as a starting point to explore how colonial legacies continue to shape today’s global crises, from geopolitics and inequality to diplomacy […]

What forms of knowledge shape the ways we relate to plants and our environment – and how can we create sustainable relationships with them?

The exhibition invites visitors to engage with historically shaped relationships with plants, ecosystems, and waters, and to reflect together on more responsible ways of engaging with the environment.

Our former Argelander Academy Fellow, Dr Judy Marcela Chaves-Agudelo, published a paper in which she worked during her stay: Chaves-Agudelo, J.M. (2025). Natures, territories and the Breath of Life: The maintenance of Jagɨyɨ or Jafaikɨ among the Murui people in the present, Colombian Amazon. Visions for Sustainability, 24, 411-426. https://doi.org/10.13135/2384-8677/12799 Abstract The Murui people’s concept ofJagɨyɨorJafaikɨsignifiesBreath […]

The Global Heritage Lab invites applications for the position ofa RESEARCH ASSISTANT (WHF, m/w/d, 10-12 hours/week). APPLICATION DEADLINE: 18.02.2026

Jun.-Prof. Dr. Julia Binter and Yohannes Mekonnen, Global Heritage Lab’s Visual Anthropology Fellow, have joined the selection committee of the 18th German International Ethnographic Film Festival (GIEFF), co-curating this year’s program. Among this year’s themes are heritage and decolonial methods, alongside films by directors from Africa, Latin America, Asia, the Pacific and Europe. These strands […]

What is the epistemological potential of bringing artists and scholars together to research fashion and its legacies of Christian mission? Jun.-Prof. Julia Binter discusses this question with regard to the project “Interwoven Dependencies. Redressing Fashion and the Heritage of Mission” at the conference “Räume öffnen. Missionssammlungen vermitteln mit künstlerischen Methoden” of the Katholische Hochschule in […]

The implicated researcher: Shifting positionalities in collaborative research and restitution projects How did the Iranian Constitutional Revolution and the Ottoman Tanzimat reforms reshape slavery across the Indian Ocean, Mediterranean, and Middle East?This talk by Behnaz Mirzai, Professor of Middle Eastern History at Brock University, examines the shared origins of Qajar Iran and the Ottoman Empire—neighboring […]

The implicated researcher: Shifting positionalities in collaborative research and restitution projects On 2 December 2025, Jun-Prof. Dr. Julia Binter will give a talk titled “The implicated researcher: Shifting positionalities in collaborative research and restitution projects.”Taking the collaborative research, exhibition and restitution project ‘Confronting Colonial Pasts, Envisioning Creative Futures’ on the collections from Namibia at the […]

Artist Talk with Cheryl McIntosh

At the center of this Artistic Talk is the portrait of “Nanny – Queen of the Maroons”. According to historical sources, Nanny was born in present-day Ghana, enslaved, and forcibly taken to Jamaica, where she became a leader of the Maroons—communities of formerly enslaved people who had liberated themselves. This participatory talk uses the idea of camouflage as a point of departure to explore artistic strategies for engaging with the past, considering dress as a form of resistance, and giving voice to marginalized people.