Art, technology and transformation at the EPO

On Saturday 19 October, the European Patent Office (EPO) welcomed the public to its Isar headquarters as part of the 25th Long Night of Munich Museums. Some 1 500 visitors gained a unique behind-the-scenes view of the building, including the EPO’s A&T 5-10 Culture Space, a site of memory and multimedia exhibitions in the Office’s former archive for paper patent files. As many visitors discovered for the first time, the exhibitions in the 3 000m² Culture Space reveal the story of contemporary art, technology and creativity from many new and surprising perspectives.

All of A&T 5-10, including its Cosmic Bar and co-working spaces, buzzed with energy and conversation until after midnight, as did all ten floors of the Isar building during high-rise tours in German and English. The tours offered unique insights into the art and architecture within, ranging from the works of the EPO art collection on display, to the circular, parliament-like chamber in which delegates from the 39 EPO member states regularly meet. Meanwhile, outside at peak time last Saturday, admission queues stretched from the A&T 5-10 entrance almost to the member states’ circle of brightly illuminated flags opposite the Boschbrücke.

Creative spirit of Europe at the heart of the race for sustainable inventions

A&T 5-10 illuminates the creative spirit of Europe through diverse artworks exploring the interface between art and technology. Tours introduced visitors to the latest special exhibition too, entitled “Transformation – Virtual and material realities in transit”, which features robotic sculptors, futuristic food production units that may support life on Mars, AI-generated seascapes and more. Further works from the EPO art collection could be seen in the exhibition “Sustaining life: Art in the climate emergency,” where a range of paintings, sculptures, photography and other installations are presented in connection with the UN Sustainable Development Goals.

Visitors were excited to follow the EPO’s international history, from the signing of the European Patent Convention (EPC) in 1973 to today, as displayed in the permanent “European Patent Journey” exhibition. EPO staff were onsite to answer the public’s many questions about every aspect of the EPO community, such as how it feels to be among the first to cast an expert eye on the latest inventions. Further topics of conversation included the sense of pride that inventors and examiners alike take in the patents that protect these inventions; as well as digitalisation and how the new ways of working at the EPO contrast with earlier ways of sharing knowledge, beginning in the early days of computerisation, when examiners routinely kept hand-written diaries complete with sketches as memory aids.   

As the race for sustainable inventions accelerates today, these exhibitions show how human creativity continually engages with the ecological, social and cultural implications of new technologies, always posing the question of what comes next – a question that artists, like inventors, have often been ahead of the wave in answering.

More about A&T 5-10

Launched as part of last October’s celebrations to mark the 50th anniversary of the EPC, the EPO’s A&T 5-10 Culture Space comprises a captivating mix of permanent and temporary exhibitions. At the intersection of contemporary art, science, technology, society, architecture and design, A&T 5-10 invites visitors to consider bold new ideas relating to the pressing questions and issues of our time. Together with its exhibits, the social and co-working spaces of A&T 5-10 encourage visitors to reflect on and discuss the roles of technology and society.