Welcome to FUTURE PLAYGROUNDS

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CHRIS
KORE

Chris Kore is a digital dreamer and new media artist working across generative visuals, CGI and live performance. Her practice explores human emotion, perception and immersive experience through moving image, real-time systems and audiovisual environments. She has created work for Boiler Room, Dekmantel, ADE, DGTL, Chris Stussy and KI/KI, and presented projects and talks at international platforms including Forward Festival, DEMO Festival, Transmediale & CTM, Roundhouse London, and many more.

Cihan
Tamti

Cihan Tamti is an independent creative director and graphic designer based in Bochum, Germany. Working across visual identities, custom typography, editorial design and cultural communication, he has collaborated with Nike, Adobe, Google, Calvin Klein and Kieler Woche. His work has been recognized by Tokyo TDC and Hiiibrands. He also teaches communication design and serves on international juries, including the Red Dot Award.

Sandra
Gesierich

Sandra Gesierich is a designer at Peter Schmidt Group, creating work that blends typography, illustration, and a mix of visual styles. Early in her design journey, she realized that great ideas come from consistent practice rather than talent alone. She began challenging herself to create every day, using each project as an opportunity to experiment, refine her craft, and develop the visual language that defines her work today.

FOREAL

Benjamin Simon and Dirk Schuster are the founders and creative leads behind FOREAL, a design and animation studio obsessed with making ideas loud, bold, and unapologetically colourful.
What started in 2013 as a two-person venture has grown into a dedicated studio of creative minds and self-proclaimed CGI nerds, all based in their hometown of Trier, Germany. Not exactly a global metropolis, right? But FOREAL has proven that you don’t need big city lights to make serious noise worldwide—just solid Wi-Fi, sharp skills, and a whole lot of passion.
From global tech giants like Google to the beloved pizza place around the corner, their client list is as diverse as their visual style. The mission stays the same every time: to create high-end 3D visuals and animations that feel tactile, playful, and impossible to scroll past.
FOREAL lives in that sweet spot where big agency quality meets direct collaboration. Clients work hand in hand with the actual artists crafting the visuals—no corporate maze, no meetings about meetings, just clear communication, good energy, and serious creative firepower.

Valeria
Schriber

Valeria Schriber is a designer from El Salvador, working at Peter Schmidt Group. Her interest in interior design developed into a broader curiosity about cultures, their histories, and the ways they influence design. She studied in Mainz and Hamburg, where she explored different approaches to visual communication and design. Her work is driven by an interest in how visual language can reflect cultural perspectives and everyday experiences.

Rifail
Ajdarpasic

Born in Stuttgart, Germany. He graduated in scenography at the Karlsruhe University of Arts and Design. Over the past 25 years, his international career as a set designer has encompassed productions at leading European opera houses, where he has collaborated with renowned theatre artists and companies. His work as a set designer, including numerous productions for which he created the sets, received various European awards. A significant part of his career has been shaped by a continuous collaboration with his partner and costume designer Ariane Isabell Unfried as a creative team.

Anastasiia
Chudnova

Anastasiia Chudnova is a project manager working across design and culture, with a background in media communications. Alongside her professional work, she maintains an independent photographic practice. Her photography explores physical spaces and people inhabiting them, examining how the everyday coexists with sentiment. Her academic interests center on media aesthetics, memory, and archive studies. Beyond her own projects, she is involved in organizing events for the photography community.

CAN TOUCH THIS
STUDIO

Can Touch This is a creative technology studio specializing in the design of interactive touch-based sound installations for museums, brands, and cultural events. Based in Paris and Berlin, the studio explores the boundaries between art, music, and technology by transforming human touch into immersive musical experiences.

A Sensory Approach to Sound
At the core of Can Touch This's work lies a deep commitment to multisensory interaction. Their installations use conductive technology and playful interfaces to turn the human body into a musical instrument. Whether through direct contact between people or through tactile interaction with objects, the studio creates sonic environments that invite exploration, connection, and discovery.

MORE SPEAKERS
COMING SOON

THURSDAY 10.09.

13:30H

Check In

15:00H

Intro

Welcome to Future Playgrounds! Lukas Cottrell and Felix Damerius will kick off the event with a warm welcome and introduce "Own Your Aura," explaining what all the fuss is about and what participants can look forward to.

15:30H

KEYNOTE:
Chris Kore

The Shape of Feeling: Designing the Invisible
As part of her practice, Chris Kore creates generative visuals for music festivals, touring shows and large-scale live performances, where color, shape and motion intertwine with sound in real time. Through recent projects, she reflects on how moving images and CGI can amplify and reimagine physical spaces, turning stages into emotional environments and shaping the audience’s experience through perception, atmosphere, music and the energy of a shared moment.

16:15H

YOUNG TALENT:

tba

16:30H

Break

16:50H

Panel Talk

Aura: Chasing the Magic
It draws you in immediately. Towards a painting, a brand, a story, a product. Aura is easier experienced physically than digitally, but it transcends media. You feel it before you can rationalize why. It‘s the difference between mere interest and outright fascination.
Yet it seems so elusive – is it a product of chance, or of intent? What is is it, and how is it created and nurtured? We invite guests from vastly different fields to unpack these questions. And we invite you to listen, ask and contribute to this panel talk.

17:35H

KEYNOTE:
Cihan Tamti

THE AURA MACHINE: How Visual Authority Is Built, Shared and Scaled
Why does the same piece of design feel more important when it carries the right name, appears in the right context or receives recognition? Drawing on self-initiated, local and international projects, Cihan Tamti explores how repetition, curation, connection, context and validation shape a designer’s aura and how creatives can build their own without becoming trapped by it.

18:20H

Break

18:40H

YOUNG TALENT:
Sandra Gesierich

started on tumblr, now we're here
A talk about the messy, rewarding, and sometimes frustrating journey of becoming a better designer. Sandra shares how creating every day, embracing experiments, and pushing through uncertainty shaped her visual language and creative process. A reflection on discipline, self-improvement, and the importance of showing up. Even when the results are not immediate. A personal exploration of whether putting in the work every single day is worth it. Spoiler: yes.

18:55H

tba

19:40H

Closing

FRIDAY 11.09.

10:00H

Workshops

12:30H

Check In

14:00H

Intro

Kick-off and welcome by Sven Rieckmann. Join us for an opening introduction and explore what's ahead.

14:05H

KEYNOTE:
FOREAL

A Pen and a Stupid Idea
Every creative talk these days seems to revolve around AI. FOREAL co-founders Dirk Schuster and Benjamin Simon take a step back, to the most human tool in the creative process: the sketch.
Through real case studies, they show how rough scribbles on paper became the starting point for viral hits, rescued projects, and unexpected creative directions. Expect honest behind-the-scenes stories about the messy and sometimes ridiculous reality of running a CGI studio. And a reminder that a pencil and a stupid idea still go a long way.

14:50H

YOUNG TALENT:
Valeria Schriber

Uprooted – Decolonizing Furniture Design
Uprooted explores how colonialism and globalization have shaped furniture design, from formal aesthetics to materials, while disconnecting traditional practices from their cultural contexts. The project creates a compendium that reconnects selected furniture with their cultural, historical, political, ecological and economic backgrounds. Divided into Form & Material, the book examines culturally specific forms and materials shaped by colonialism and global exchange.

15:05H

KEYNOTE:
Rifail Ajdarpasic

Behind the Scenes. Beyond the Surface:
An exploration of the central significance of “aura” in the performing arts, particularly in the context of music theatre and opera. How is an atmospherically powerful and visually compelling space created? How can one communicate with an audience on this level? How do ideas and artistic concepts take concrete form and manifest themselves in a stage design? What are the broader processes, personal approaches, and guiding ideas behind the designer’s work? Insights into my creative practice as a set designer, illustrated through visual examples.

15:50H

Break

16:10H

YOUNG TALENT:
Anastasiia Chudnova

Future Photo Archive
What will happen to the thousands of images stored on our phones? I asked myself this question while browsing my family albums – analog and carefully curated. As someone who takes a lot of pictures too, I started wondering: what makes an image more likely to survive digital oblivion? Why do we value some photographs more than others? I ended up dedicating my Master’s thesis to this. In my presentation I’ll share key insights from it and showcase some of my photography.

16:25H

KEYNOTE & Performance:
Can Touch This Studio

Making the Intangible Tangible
In a world increasingly shaped by screens and digital interactions, Can Touch This explores how technology can bring us back to physical experience rather than take us away from it. Through sound, touch, movement and materials, the studio creates multisensory experiences where audiences become active participants. In this talk, Vincent de Malherbe will explore Can Touch This’ creative approach through a selection of projects, looking at how tangible interactions can transform our perception of objects and spaces, create emotional connections, and give them a unique presence — or aura. The talk will conclude with a 5-10-minute small demos , bringing these ideas into a physical and sonic experience.

17:10H

Closing