Knowledge Spaces of Globalization: Musealizing the Spatial Assemblages of Global Trade

Relying on theoretical concepts of space and knowledge production and employing collecting as art-based research practice, this ethnographic-artistic PhD project asks how the spaces of globalization and global logistics are transformed into the future German Port Museum in Hamburg. Museal collecting and spatial design are addressed as key factors in this transformation process. In a first research phase, the museum's development is explored using ethnographic methods of field research. Based on these findings, a series of experimental collecting setups is realized in the Duckdalben International Seamen's Club in Hamburg to explore non-academic bodies of knowledge and non-hegemonic perspectives on global trade. This second phase uses means of participatory art-based research to open the museum's spacio-epistemic configurations through material and ephemeral items collected by otherwise unheard and unseen actors of globalization.