📍New location: Patrice Lumumba Galerie, Berlin Global Village, Am Sudhaus 2, 12053 Berlin

What if architectural renders aren't just pictures of future buildings, but machines designed to hijack imagination? This workshop explores how hyper-realistic digital renderings and CGI shape our understanding of the future before it even exists. Rather than treating architectural renders as simple pictures of planned buildings, this research looks at them as complex, multi-layered objects that actively produce power, attract global capital, and build political consensus.

On August 26, 2026, the United States designated the Italian hacktivist collective Autistici/Inventati as terrorist organisation, alleging that it provided support to radical violent actions. This act was conducted without any actual legal process neither in the EU or in the US and, following the freezing of A/I bank accounts and users’ donations by Banca Etica, the collective was forced to shut down after 25 years of activity. For more than two decades they provided 20,000 email accounts, 10,000 blogs on the NoBlogs platform, 5,000 mailing lists, and 1,500 websites. What do these sanctions mean for German independent tech infrastructures and open-source networks? Why is the case of Autistici/Inventati so relevant both in Germany, Europe and worldwide? Are there measures to counter these threats? And if yes, what could they be?

TESTING GROUNDS explores the risks associated with the introduction of artificial intelligence, automated target recognition, and data extraction into our everyday lives, both online and offline.

It demonstrates how these technologies have previously been adopted in war zones and at borders, which have served as testing grounds, to be then expanded to civil society at large. To gain a deeper understanding of the complexities surrounding this phenomenon, we aim to explore the role of data capitalism, monopolies of Big Tech, AI and surveillance technologies that promote a worldview grounded in exploitation, extraction and domination.