How can we live with water differently?

From 3–6 September 2026, the River Spree will host the fourth Confluence of European Water Bodies in Berlin. For four days, rivers, lakes, lagoons, glaciers, seas, and wetlands from across Europe will gather to explore a set of shared questions: How can we learn to live with water differently? What responsibilities emerge when we recognise aquatic ecosystems as living entities? And how do we build cultures of care around water? This year’s edition, curated by Symbiotic Lab, unfolds across four locations in Berlin: FLUSSBAD Campus, SPORE Initiative, Spreepark Art Space and Floating University Berlin. Over four days, participants will gather through workshops, performances, collective meals, rituals, listening sessions, artistic interventions, public conversations, and a multispecies parliament. The programme also features a keynote by renowned hydrofeminist philosopher and cultural theorist Astrida Neimanis.

The Confluence is a growing pan-European network of water bodies and their communities, working across art, ecology, law, activism, research, and public engagement. Launched in 2023 by the Embassy of the North Sea, TBA21–Academy, and ILP Mar Menor at the shores of the Spanish saltwater lagoon, the first ecosystem in Europe with legal personhood, it calls for the legal and cultural recognition of water bodies as living entities with rights, intrinsic value, and agency. Acting as a campaign, research network, and community of practice, the Confluence explores what forms of democracy, governance, and stewardship might emerge when ecosystems are recognized as political and legal actors alongside humans. Launched in 2023 by the Embassy of the North Sea, TBA21–Academy, and ILP Mar Menor, the Spree Confluence is curated by Léon Gross and Jakob Kukula of the Berlin-based ecological design studio Symbiotic Lab, and organized in close collaboration with local partners including the Rights of the Spree initiative, the Berlin University Alliance and the Confluence “Stream”, a coordination group organizing the network’s long-term development and continuity across Europe.

Links:
Confluence of European Water Bodies 2026