Denise Lee / 李筑 (lǐ zhú) (USA/Hong Kong/Taiwan) is an interdisciplinary artist based in Leipzig. She uses interviews, creative writing and other dialogic encounters to fuel her work in sound art, performance, intervention and short film. With a background in public art (MFA, Bauhaus Universität, 2020), post-colonial studies, civic education and object making (BFA, Rhode Island School of Design 2015), Denise seeks to create and facilitate spaces for connection and reflection, and often works with participation as a key element. Her current research deals with alienation and longing in postmodernity and diasporic storytelling.

“Mourning is about dwelling with a loss and so coming to appreciate what it means, how the world has changed, and how we must ourselves change and renew our relationships if we are to move forward from here.”
– Thom van Dooren, Keeping Faith with Death: Mourning and De-Extinction (2013)

Mourning Utopia is a two-part workshop that will take place over two days. In the first part, participants will use dialogue and creative writing to create their own laments, and in the second, they will develop a collective performance of the texts with the help of guiding exercises to help them vocalize and use the space.

Participants will work with the concept of the lament as a method for processing fear, anxiety and grief, and transforming them into possibilities for action. Whether it is the need to mourn abstract concepts of what the future is understood to be, or the concrete loss of human and non-human lives constantly streaming through our feeds and consciousness, this workshop would like to open a space to express and share grief in order for participants to move forward together.

TingAn Ying ( 鄞廷安 ) is a Han-Taiwanese artist based in Berlin working at the intersection of choreography, performance, and facilitation. Her practice is inherently collaborative and interdisciplinary; she critically examines social constructs while probing themes of memory, narrative, body politics, and power dynamics. TingAn facilitates workshops for both professionals and the public, with a focus on confronting internalised hegemony. Her practice extends into dramaturgy, production, and research within the fields of cultural studies and curatorial work.

As a dancer, TingAn has collaborated with acclaimed artists including Alexandra Waierstall, Falk Richter, Anouk van Dijk, and Emanuel Gat. Her creative and facilitative work has been presented at prominent institutions such as Münchner Kammerspiele, Festival d’Avignon, Théâtre National de Chaillot, Frankfurt Lab, SAVVY Contemporary, and Kunstquartier Bethanien.

Primarily movement and body based, this workshop is an open score for practitioners from all disciplines who are curious to experience and experiment with "thinking through the body."

Through intentional, meditative bodily exercises, participants are guided to explore themes of authenticity, authorship, collaboration, and coexistence in relation to their own current research topics as well as the broader socio-political context. The space serves as a laboratory for those looking to proactively integrate lived experience into their creative and collaborative processes.

Participants are highly encouraged to integrate their existing individual practices and methodologies into the conversation.

Yumo Cheng, Tingyu and Sabina are a triad of Chinese-born creators in Berlin: A Fox Fairy deconstructing power through queer-feminist dreaming; A fallen Alien navigating the distance of belonging, and an anthropologist seeking truth through sensory cooking and observation. From artistic research to migrant perspectives, we weave our identities—alien, fox, and seeker—into a collective practice of 'figuring it out' while remaining purposefully out of place.

Building on their recent performance We People Do What , the trio invites participants to enter a somatic laboratory where they collectively dismantle the hegemony of genital-centricity. The workshops begins with a live demonstration of choreographed intimacies, serving as a catalyst for participants to join in a collective body sculpture. Through structured re-enactment and fictionalized performance, participants will guided you anatomize the "body without organs," using the skin and touch as sites for linguistic renegotiation.

This is a space of radical imagination and personal expression, where participants are encouraged to manifest their inner narratives and strip away the discomfort of binary labels. The workshop strives to create a safe, diverse, and empowering environment; All are welcome, but priority is given to the needs and presence of queer women and the queer community. Join the trio in this body-scale reconstruction to transform the myth of gender into an infinite laboratory of collective empowerment.

(This project was originally initiated by Owa Mesa, and the first performance was staged by a collective comprising Mesa, Yumo, Sabina, and Tingyu. Due to personal reasons, Mesa is unable to participate in this workshop.)

Mudassir Sheikh is a Berlin-based artist and musician from Pakistan, exploring sound, ritual, myth, and the uncanny. Using field recordings, voice, and composition, he uncovers hidden ecologies, spiritual practices, and sonic textures in urban and coastal spaces. His recent work investigates Sufi shrines and water as sites of listening, healing, and transformation. His work has been presented at Gaudeamus, Oslo National Museum, TBA21, and Colomboscope. He was nominated for the Forecast Platform and awarded the Berlin Senate Research Stipend for Visual Art.

What if listening could change what a place appears to be?

This workshop invites participants to experience listening as an active, embodied tool for collective re-worlding. Participants dive into collective listening and sound-making. Through deep listening, they attune to their surroundings, record sounds on their phones, and explore how everyday audio can be transformed into new sonic worlds through playful sound experiments, rooted in memory, place, and shared experience, all the while attending to the subtle textures of their surroundings. No experience needed, just curiosity and attention.

The session culminates in a collaborative process of sonic re-imagining, where simple tools are used to transform everyday recordings into speculative landscapes. It concludes with a listening circle emphasising sound as an interdisciplinary archive for building new narratives and shared meanings.

Kim D. Vu is a Berlin-based musician, composer, and sound artist working across metal, noise, and experimental music. Their practice explores distortion, feedback, and the physicality of sound through performance, collaboration, and installations. Kim composes for film and audiovisual works, building dense, tension-driven sound structures, and plays in the experimental metal band Hugging.

This workshop invites participants to explore the scream as a physical, emotional, and sound-based practice. Screaming is more than a vocal technique - it is a way to access intensity, presence, and expression beyond language.

Through guided warm-ups for body and voice, we will develop a safe and sustainable approach to vocal distortion, as well as experiment with raw, unprocessed shouting. Participants will learn different techniques while discovering how little force is actually needed to produce powerful sounds.

The workshop creates a supportive group environment where you can release tension, explore your voice without pressure, and draw inspiration from others. We will work collectively to build confidence through a shared experience.

No prior experience in music or singing is required. This workshop is open to anyone interested in voice work, including musiciansperformers, actors, and those simply curious about expanding their expressive range. Bring some water and whatever is waiting to be released.

To close APAL@WERKSTATT , we invite you to a final evening dedicated to the vital practice of Community Fun—a space where we reclaim leisure, feast together, and let our voices soar in a different kind of harmony.

Come help us close this chapter with a bang. It’s an invitation to take up space, to laugh, and to find home in the company of one another. Let’s eat, dance, and sing!