Siegfried Zielinski: Optics, Automata and Experimental Culture in the First, Arab-Islamic Renaissance

Art is primarily oriented towards things that can be grasped with the natural eye, while science has been using instruments since the 16th century to reach previously inaccessible »res invisibiles« of the microcosm and the macrocosm. Today, in the digital age, artists increasingly work with the same tools, methods and programs as science. This common »pool of tools« points to the beginning of a scientification of art, as the Italian Renaissance had already aimed at.
With the research and exhibition project »Renaissance 3.0«, the ZKM | Karlsruhe dedicates itself to the new alliances of art and science in the 21st century. The symposium hosts renowned scientists and Nobel Prize winners from disciplines such as quantum physics, biochemistry, medicine and art history.