ICI Berlin - Kulturlabor Berlin

Stipendienausschreibung

Gegenwärtig keine Stipendienausschreibungen

 

Die Bewerbungsfrist für unsere letzte Ausschreibung lief am 10.1.10 ab. 

 

Leider können wir keine Bewerbungen vor unserer nächsten Ausschreibung annehmen, die  vermutlich Mitte November 2010 u.a. über diese Webseite und unseren Newsletter erfolgen wird.

 

Letzte Ausschreibung

 

Kippbilder/Multistable Figures as Models for Tension/Spannung

The Berlin Institute for Cultural Inquiry announces six fellowships for 2010/11 with the focus Kippbilder/Multistable Figures of the core project Tension/Spannung.

The Berlin Institute for Cultural Inquiry (ICI Berlin) is an independent centre dedicated to bringing diverse cultures and discourses into productive confrontation. The Institute formulates core projects that run over several years and form a starting point for resident fellows to work through common, focused questions.

The Institute's current core project is called Tension/Spannung. The expression ‘tension’ appears in manifold contexts with diverse meanings. We speak of social, religious, electrical, sexual, and creative tension. In all these cases, tension refers to an unstable state on the verge of a dynamic process that may be destructive as well as productive. Tension provides the condition for transformations, but determines neither their beginning nor outcome. As a state of undecided potentiality, tension promises us agency and demands our involvement, while also captivating us aesthetically. By exploring the critical role of tension, the inaugural project of the ICI Berlin also seeks to reflect upon the Institute’s mission.

 

For its fourth announcement, the ICI Berlin takes multistable figures – Kippbilder – as point of departure for exploring further the topic of Tension/Spannung. These images not only continue to fascinate cognitive scientists as a class of optical illusions, but they also function as models for probing complex epistemological, aesthetic and ethical tensions.

We see either duck or rabbit, but not both at the same time. Yet the image cannot be reduced to either, it is neither (only) duck nor (only) rabbit, but both duck and rabbit. The combination of simultaneity (the coexistence of aspects in one image) and consecution (the change of one aspect to another) yields both either/or and both/and. At the same time, the image forms no synthesis. That one image should lead to the recognition of different shapes also means that the perceived shape is both less and more than the sensory data given by the image. The unity of the shape – the Gestalt of duck or rabbit – is more than the sum of black and white pixels in the image, even if it forms only one aspect of the image. Multistable images highlight the activity of the perceiving subject, but as we can agree on the recognised shapes, it promotes no radical subjectivism, relativism or constructivism. Rather, it promises the possibility of productively mediating and distinguishing between subject and object, reality and construction, natural and conventional categories.

Such Kippbilder, where one can easily shift from one aspect to another, seem to be rare. On the one hand, most images do not seem to allow for multiple aspects. While there is no reason to believe that alternatives should be possible for any recognised shape, imagining other ways of seeing, experiencing and living, making them visible and realising them in an irreversible manner is the task of all revolutionaries – not only in politics, but also in art or even science: “What were ducks in the scientist’s world before the revolution are rabbits afterwards” (Kuhn). On the other hand, even when images allow for several aspects, each perceived Gestalt often relies not only on eliminating other potential shapes, but also on reducing the image’s complexity, marking a few traits while ignoring others.

Rather than implying revolutions, different aspects can co-exist in different disciplines, different systems, discourses and cultures. Each has the view of a complete reality in which nothing is missing, but none describes all of reality. While it is questionable whether it makes sense to posit here a pre-recognised reality – i.e. to apply the duck-rabbit model–, what seems to be clear is that the practice of shifting back and forth between different aspects and seeking to re-integrate elements recognised only from another perspective carries a productive potential. It may not lead to a better, fuller description, let alone to a synthesis, but does help in producing fruitful tensions on either side in contradistinction to an indifferent co-existence or violent conflict.

Applicants from all disciplines are invited to link their individual project to the ICI Berlin's current core project and engage in a joint investigation which takes Kippbilder/Multistable Figures as one possible model of Tension/Spannung and as a starting point for exploring its manifold dimensions and modalities.

The productive exchange between fellows is a central aim of the Institute. Applicants should be interested in a theoretical reflection upon the conceptual and intellectual basis of their projects and in discussing it with fellows from other disciplines. In particular, fellows will be expected to participate in the weekly colloquia, bi-weekly informal meetings, and other activities of the Institute and to be resident in Berlin for the duration of the fellowship.

The fellowships announced are for the academic year 2010-11 (20 September – 8 July) and may be renewable for one additional year. Shorter fellowships for one or several terms (Fall: 20 Sep – 10 Dec, Winter: 10 Jan – 25 Mar, Spring: 26 Apr – 8 Jul) may be requested. Depending on the degree held, stipends range from EUR 1300 to 1700 per month. The fellowships come with a research budget for organising activities contributing to the core project.

 

Applicants from all disciplines holding a university degree are welcome to apply. The Institute seeks to diversify its profile and therefore particularly welcomes applications with projects related to the natural and social sciences. There is no age limit, but fellows must have completed their education (BA, MA, PhD, or Habil) within ten years of the date of appointment.

Interested applicants should consult the application instructions at www.ici-berlin.org/fellowships/application-instructions/ and send their application by e-mail only to the address indicated there.

 

Please feel free to download the flyer (140kB) and distribute it widely.