Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin

Address

Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin
Unter den Linden 6
10099 Berlin

Office

Room 2025

Contact

Phone: +49 30 2093-20030
vpf (at) hu-berlin.de

 

Curriculum Vitae

Prof. Dr. Claudia Mareis is an expert in design and cultural history. Since April 2021, she has held a professorship in Design and History of Knowledge at the Institute for Cultural History and Theory at Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin. Since 2019, she has been co-spokesperson for the interdisciplinary Cluster of Excellence “Matters of Activity. Image Space Material” at HU Berlin. Her research addresses 20th-century design history and theory, knowledge cultures in the design, the cultural history of creativity, as well as material culture studies.

After initial training in graphic design, she studied design, art, and cultural studies in Zurich, Berlin, and Linz. In 2009, she received her doctorate with a discourse-analytical thesis on design as epistemic culture. She worked as a research lecturer from 2009 to 2011 at the Bern University of the Arts, from 2011 to 2013, she was a postdoctoral researcher at the NCCR Iconic Criticism „eikones” at the University of Basel. Research visits took her to the Max Planck Institute for the History of Science in Berlin in 2009 and to the MIT in Cambridge, Massachusetts, in 2012. From 2013 to 2021, she held a professorship in design theory and research at theAcademy of Art and Design Basel FHNW. There, she headed the Institute for Experimental Design and Media Cultures as well as the Critical Media Lab, which she founded.

As a member of several leading research associations in Germany and Switzerland, she has actively contributed to the establishment of design research in German-speaking countries. From 2016 to 2020, she was vice president of the Swiss Design Network and from 2008 to 2021, she was a board member of the German Society for Design Theory and Research. From 2018 to 2021, she was also a research councilor of the Swiss National Science Foundation (SNSF) in the Humanities and Social Sciences Division.

Since 1 October 1 2025 she has been deputy of the Vice President for Research as the Executive Committee Representative for Research until this position is filled.

Staff

• Research Lounge

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