Cooperation with the German Schauspielhaus Hamburg/Rimini Protokoll

"World Climate Conference"

Hamburg, November and December 2014/2015. The 21st UN Climate Change Conference, COP 21, will take place in Paris on 30 November - 11 December 2015. The annual climate conferences - "Conferences of the Parties" (COP) - are political and media major events with its own structure and dramaturgy. A struggle for numbers and formulations, alliances are forged, action plans are implemented - and much is being negotiated in small groups "outside" the main plenary.

The artists' collective 'Rimini Protokoll' has created a three-hour model-like simulation, summarizing what takes place in the real world in three weeks. The audience assumes the positions of the delegates; they meet for plenary in the great hall of the Schauspielhaus, go in small groups through the entire theatre to country- and theme-specific meetings. They are guided by eighteen experts from climate research institutions (e.g. from the Alfred Wegener Institute), from politics and from public organizations, presenting the background and facts about the struggle for an international climate policy. How are resolutions at a climate change conference adopted? How is the voting, and how do the 196 delegations make unanimous decisions? How are individual countries deliberately ignored? What delegations are the blockers - the dinosaurs of the day? 

In the "World Climate Conference" at the Schauspielhaus viewers do not only get the essential facts from the experts, they can experience especially the conflicts, the discourse of the conflicting opinions and interests. Each performance will be adapted to the current situation of the negotiations between and during the climate conferences, so that every night discussions and negotiations will be up to date.

The premiere took place in 2014 while the UN Climate Change Conference was held in Lima.

Video clip for the production of "Welt-Klimakonferenz"

Cooperation with the School of Architecture, Hochschule Bremen

Architecture Competition

Design of a New Arctic Research Station

Bremen / Bremerhaven, July 2013. To mark the anniversary of the Franco-German research station AWIPEV on Spitsbergen, the Alfred Wegener Institute initiated a design seminar and architectural competition for students in the fourth semester in collaboration with the School of Architecture of the Hochschule Bremen (City University of Applied Sciences). For ten years German and French scientists have been working side by side at the AWIPEV Research Base, but a joint station building is still missing. Through this design project, the Alfred Wegener Institute wanted to give young talents the opportunity to contribute their ideas in the planning process of a new station.

The winner is the then 21-year-old architecture student Manuel Kämmerer. With his design of a new Arctic research station he won against 22 fellow students. The Alfred Wegener Institute honoured his idea with a flight to Ny-Ålesund on the west coast of Spitsbergen - to the place where the new research station could be built according to his design. In addition, he received a travel allowance of 300 euros from the "Friends' Association" of the Alfred Wegener Institute.

Movie Screening

Chasing Ice

Bremen / Bremerhaven, January 2014. The Alfred Wegener Institute brought the award-winning documentary "Chasing Ice" for the first time in North German cinemas. Cooperation partners were: the Schauburg Bremen, the City 46 Municipal Cinema Bremen, the CineMotion Bremerhaven and the Klimahaus Bremerhaven.

The documentation of the National-Geopraphic photographer James Balog is an impressive demonstration of climate-induced changes of the planet: His fascinating time-lapse photography shows how mountains of ice - that exist for centuries - disappear with increasing pace. Rarely climate change could be seen in such spectacular images. "Chasing Ice" premiered in 2012 after three years of shooting time at the Sundance Film Festival and was awarded the "Excellence in Cinematography" award. In the same year 20 other festival awards followed, including several "best documentary awards".

The two screenings of "Chasing Ice" were accompanied by the AWI climate scientist Dr Klaus Grosfeld, who answered questions from the audience. Klaus Grosfeld examines the impact of ice sheets and ice shelves on the sea level.

German trailer of "Chasing Ice"