Carsten Goertz is a designer/strategist with a focus on long-term projects at infrastructural scale. Programmatically, he seeks to apply ecological thought in the design of the technosphere, and to develop technology-infused modes of care for the biosphere. To this end, he co-founded a planetary research and design practice called Neo-Metabolism, just before the pandemic hit.
In an earlier life, he provided creative direction to high profile design teams across the industries of fashion, music, and tech. During the five years leading up to Neo-Metabolism, he worked on projects ranging from the redesign of the Apple Store, to the launches of Apple Watch and Apple Services, Raf Simon’s website, a user-in-residence program with LOT2046, strategy reports and brand visions for large automotive and telecom brands, takeover-installations at Nike Labs, and holistic communication concepts for early social enterprises.
In parallel to this industry work, he taught as an Assistant Professor for Visual Methods at the Institute for Music and Media in Düsseldorf, with a research focus on the conflicted notion of the world as a computer. This interest dates back to his thesis on astrophysical data visualisation as a method of constructing the universe, at the Academy of Media Arts in Cologne (Flux Aeterna, 2008). Since then, he lectured on critical computational design at academic venues across Japan, Brazil, Germany, Portugal and the Baltics. Heavily influenced by noise and club music, he also staged data-based, post rave AV shows at international festivals and cultural institutions, in frequent collaboration with composer/performer Marcus Schmickler.
He is a son of a butcher from the German countryside, and grew up without internet. Leaving the event horizon of a black hole requires an escape velocity faster than light.
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