Sprossen

Sprossen, which translates to "sprouts" or "shoots" but also to "ladder rungs," is a student-run publishing initiative founded by students at the Berlin University of the Arts. Our name reflects the platforms role as being the first steps in our graphic designer and publishing journey, while also carrying the connotation of growing together and showing something new like shoots emerging through cracks in concrete. Working in different constellations on diverse subjects, this year's selection has a focus on archiving, architecture, and experimental printing methods. Exploratory publishing approaches include magazines, books, and smaller ephemera.

Gian Zarotti, (De)Contextualizing Landscapes, 2025, © Gian Zarotti

(De)contextualizing Landscapes uses the concept of "topomnesia" to explore the emotional charge of landscapes that have been heavily influenced by human activity. Interviews, memory protocols, diary entries, and photography serve as the means to do so.

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Protocol 15. R.I.P. – remember me, UdK Berlin, 2025

Let me a good archive, and I will design you a good building. We are always building upon various foundations–other peoples’ projects, built and unbuilt, references from near and far, past memories and half-forgotten dreams. What is there to stay? Tell us about the buildings that are not-to-be-forgotten and the ones you have unearthed from the depths of history. The ones whose spirit deserves to be documented in order to serve us for the future. (Or tell us what you deem is world cultural junk instead.¹) Laid to rest on external hard drives: the beloved projects that never saw the light of the day. Let us offer you a frame to let them go–revisited or not. For in these fragments lies a narrative of risks taken and of lessons learned. Should it be incomplete? Will it be missed? And do not let us talk then about restoration!² What is to be done with what we find existing–what happened with the yellow lines in your plans? Between a growing portion of land marked as museums, we are negotiating anew how to deal with what is there: are they to be left to the effects of time or to be collaged into new usages and outlooks? Will there be remnants of them, telling about their former wholeness? Protocol 15 is an ode to the spirit of remembrance, let us honor these architectural apparitions, for they are more than just structures; they are reflections of the human spirit, immortalized in brick and mortar.

Editorial: Louis Baurmann, Franka Matthes, Elias Richter, Johanna Imke Tapper, Lea Schanz, Valentin Zimmermann, Anna Leticia Merdžan
Graphic Design: Béla Machemer, Eli Zaza Moysiopoulou, Gerrit Ludwig, Konstantin Wagner, Nora Veismann

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Queer concepts and queer-feminist history provide potential for creative work. Drawing on archival materials, queer theory and artistic approaches, new, inclusive ways of creating are explored. For greater creativity and queer visibility in graphic design.

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