Synergies: selected projects 2026

International Hackteria Society (Zurich, Switzerland),
tomorrow.Lab (Chiang Mai, Thailand),
Pa Rang Cafe & Art Stay (Chiang Mai, Thailand),
Swiss Mechatronic Art Society (SGMK) (Zurich, Switzerland),
HAZE DIFFUSION Project (Berlin, Germany / Manila, Philippines),
Srishti Manipal Institute of Art, Design & Technology (Bengaluru, India),
Serrum / GudRnD (Indonesia),
BEAK (USA),
ART2M/Makery (France),
Futuristic Research Cluster (FREAK Lab) (Thailand),
Wise Mouse (Taiwan),
EAR – Environmental Artistic Research (Switzerland)

Co-Laboratories: Technobiological Futures is a collaborative project that brings together mutual learning and knowledge exchange driven by a shared fascination with biology, ranging from ecological science to synthetic biology as it merges with digital technologies. It connects the Global Hackteria Network and the Swiss Mechatronic Art Society (SGMK) with tomorrow.Lab in Thailand, as well as a wider network of partners across Southeast Asia and India. Centred on DIWO (Do‑It‑With‑Others) participation, the project encourages experimentation across diverse perspectives and disciplines. Co‑Laboratories offer a liminal space to question how ecosystems, bodies, and machines evolve together, and how these shifts ripple into politics, culture, and ethics. Within this framework, cultural practitioners from the aforementioned countries co‑develop low‑cost instruments, bio‑sensing device art, performances, and media works. They also produce open‑access documentation and organise public hands‑on workshops, fostering shared knowledge and accessible innovation. This project is nurturing networks in the global hackteria activities that have proven their value over many years, giving them the resources to flourish and scale.

‘Getting people to collectively experiment on disciplines beyond their field to open new creative pathways. If we understand each other more, we can do more.’

Weeratouch ‘Wave’ Pongruengkiat (TH), tomorrow.Lab, Lead Thai partner, organiser of the Thai Co-Laboratories

‘It’s really meaningful for the local art scene to exchange with other collectives in Asia. I want to have a deeper knowledge of current developments and pressing issues in art and technology.’

Bora Hong (KR/TH), Pa Rang Co. Ltd, Co-curator and organiser

Out in the Loop (Zurich, Switzerland),
Neubad (Lucerne, Switzerland),
Sonic Shaman (Taipei, Taiwan),
TheCube Project Space (Taipei, Taiwan)

OUT IN THE LOOP x SONIC SHAMAN | SONIC Shaman x OUT IN THE LOOP is an innovative event format that takes place in a hybrid setting across multiple locations simultaneously, with all sites interconnected and contributing to a shared programme. The festival is dedicated to exploring trends and phenomena in global pop cultures through artistic, academic, and experience-driven formats. By intentionally breaking away from traditional event structures, it offers a vital experimental space for new forms of exchange and collaboration across distances, providing significant impetus for forward-looking event practices.

The 2026 edition will run for 24 hours and be held concurrently in Lucerne (Switzerland) and Taipei (Taiwan) showcasing artists from the two regions. An identical telematic set-up at both venues—real-time, life-size transmission of sound and image—forms the backbone and playground for various event formats.

‘Overall, the festival provides a unique platform for transcultural and transdisciplinary exchange. (…) Our objective is to engage diverse audiences by dismantling traditional barriers between academia and experience-based formats. Moreover, the festival seeks to foster sustainable partnerships among participating institutions and experts, encouraging long-term synergies.‘

Brooke Jackson, Curating Team, Co-Lead, Out in the Loop Festival

transmediale e.V. (Berlin, Germany),
HEK (House of Electronic Arts) (Münchenstein/Basel, Switzerland),
Pleamar (Buenos Aires & Mar del Plata, Argentina),
ETH AI Center (Zürich, Switzerland)

A cooperation project between cultural and research partners in Switzerland, Germany, and Argentina, coExistence explores how human and synthetic agents can meet, interact, and imagine futures together. Bridging arts and sciences, the programme seeks to reframe synthetic worlds as spaces for empathy, dialogue, and mutual invention. It asks how artists and researchers can open up possibilities for trust, curiosity, and shared agency together with machines, artefacts, bots, and other forms of artificial intelligence. Through a series of residencies and new commissions, the programme aims to generate three original works that probe the boundaries of human-synthetic coexistence.

HEK and transmediale share a long-standing professional relationship, having followed and engaged with each other’s programmes over many years. At the same time, HEK was approached by Pleamar, whose connection originated during Mesh Festival through a research trip supported by Pro Helvetia. Bringing the three partners together enabled a dialogue between European and South American perspectives, fostering an integrated and situated approach to art, technology, and environmental concerns.

Swiss Museum and Center for Electronic Music Instruments (SMEM) (Fribourg, Switzerland),
Santuri East Africa (Nairobi, Kenya),
Kilele Summit (Nairobi, Kenya)

Circuits is a collaboration between Santuri East Africa and the Swiss Museum for Electronic Music Instruments (SMEM). The project connects musical innovation cultures of East Africa and Switzerland through hardware-synthesis workshops, instrument-design labs, artist residencies, and knowledge-exchange programmes. By bringing together East Africa’s DIY culture with Afrofuturism, the project repositions modular and hardware systems as accessible tools for expression and innovation.

‘We want to connect East African musical traditions and modular synthesis inside an Afrofuturist framework. Circuits is not just about sound — it’s about re-imagining futures where African heritage, technology, and creativity shape new ideas.’

Kimina, Artist, Santuri East Africa

Espacio Odeón (Bogotá, Colombia),
MSD (Daniela Gutiérrez-González & Sebastián Mira) (Colombia/Online),
La Becque (La Tour-de-Peilz, Switzerland)

Technical Skins and the Epidermic Web is a trinational fellowship connecting artists and institutions from Colombia, Mexico, and Switzerland to explore art, technology, and embodied knowledge. Reimagining the skin as a sensitive interface for governance, presence, and intimacy, the project unfolds through research (La Becque), production (Materia Abierta), and public engagement (Espacio Odeón). MSD provides curatorial direction, weaving a translocal network of complicities that cultivates digital affectivity, sustainable knowledge exchange, and radical collaboration.

This collaboration emerged from MSD’s longstanding relationships with Espacio Odeón and La Becque, which then connected with Materia Abierta through Odeón’s network. Together, they developed the conceptual framework, with each institution contributing its expertise: La Becque in artist residencies, Materia Abierta in critical pedagogy, and Espacio Odeón in community engagement.

‘At the core of the fellowship lies the idea of the skin as interface: a porous threshold where perception, intimacy, and collective imaginaries are negotiated. Conceived not as a limit but as a site of passage, the skin resonates with the fellowship’s interest in (ex)intimacy and the crafting of relational technologies—forms of encounter that stretch across screens, bodies, and environments.’

MSD (Daniela Gutiérrez-González & Sebastián Mira), Curatorial Collective

Association PPING / Mapping Festival (Geneva, Switzerland),
EyeMyth Festival (New Dehli, India)

This multi-year platform, developed by the EyeMyth Festival (India) and the Mapping Festival (Switzerland) aims to build a sustainable bridge for artistic collaboration. In the first year (2026), the initiative lays the groundwork for this partnership, while the second year (2027) introduces two month-long residencies for Indo–Swiss artists, culminating in showcases at both Mapping Festival and EyeMyth Media Arts Festival. This femme-forward exchange focuses on co-creation, workshops, and the development of a permanent creative lab.

This project is the culmination of several years of organic collaboration between the Indian and Swiss media arts communities. This partnership will allow the participating organisations to explore new hybrid forms combining technology and cultural heritage, while strengthening international artistic and institutional networks. Ultimately, the project aspires to foster the creation of works that resonate with diverse audiences and promote intercultural dialogue. Aligning with the local dynamics in Geneva, with venues like Base Design and Downtown Studio, the project aims to support both emerging and established artists from Switzerland and around the world.

In Fine (Geneva, Switzerland),
Impakt (Utrecht, Netherlands),
WRO Art Center (Wroclaw, Poland),
Sporobole (Sherbrooke, QC, Canada),
Instrument Inventors Initiative (The Hague, Netherlands),
Holo (online)

(IN)FUSE aims to build a framework that sheds light on technological transformations, brings together various ecosystems and serves as a source of mutual inspiration for a selection of four Swiss artists. Unfolding in two distinct yet complementary phases, the project will first give the selected artists an opportunity to participate in an extensive dialogue, critical discussion and co-creation, before undertaking a three-week residency at one of the partners facilities (Impakt, Sporobole, WRO Art Center and Instrument Inventors Initiative). Each partner organisation has been carefully selected for its existing activities, its identity and the context of the project.

‘How can we build new collective narratives and explore the massive cultural changes in our society through the lens of artistic creation? Our goal is to empower artists in their phases of reflection, experimentation and exchange of knowledge, while leaning on the resources of international partners operating in the field of art and technology.’

Ana Ascencio, Founder and Coordinator, In Fine

Visibility for Transformation Lab (VIFT) (Geneva, Switzerland),
Festival FILMAR en América Latina (Geneva, Switzerland),
re/presentare (Mexico City, Mexico),
International Relations & Music Association (IRMA), (Neuchâtel, Switzerland)

Fragments of Diasporic Memories is a transdisciplinary project exploring how diasporic communities in Switzerland engage with memories of violence, displacement, disappearance and loss. Through qualitative research, roundtables, as well as participatory and co-created workshops in cooking, music, and dance, the project fosters embodied and collective practices of remembrance. These processes culminate in an immersive exhibition presented during FILMAR 2026 Film Festival in Geneva and later in Mexico City, integrating the workshops outputs with immersive digital technologies (VR and sound design). The project aims to foreground diasporic memory practices while strengthening social cohesion, empathy, and violence prevention across affected and non-affected communities in Switzerland.

The partnership between VIFT, FILMAR, and re/presentare builds on shared commitments to artistic interdisciplinary research and transnational cultural and sociopolitical dialogue. Through overlapping networks in Geneva’s academic and artistic communities, and a shared interest in reversing North–South knowledge flows, the three institutions recognized strong conceptual and methodological synergies and decided to collaborate for the purpose of this project.

‘Through this collaboration, we hope to create a shared space where creative memory methods, artistic practice, investigative rigor, and lived experience intersect.’

Aline Wani and Maevia Griffiths, Co-Directors and Co-Founders of the Visibility for Transformation Lab