SCIENTIST: Bertolt Meyer is a full Professor for Work and Organizational Psychology at Chemnitz University of Technology and Speaker of the CRC 1410 "Hybrid Societies". His research focuses on the impact of technology on social systems including the psychological effects of human body augmentation, the digital transformation of the workplace, and diversity.
Meyer is an associate editor for Frontiers in Psychology: Organizational Psychology and at Small Group Research. He received his PhD in 2007 from Humboldt University Berlin and worked as postdocoral researcher at the Institute of Psychology at the University of Zurich, Switzerland, from 2008-2014 before coming to Chemnitz.
Meyer currently hosts the science documentary series „agree to disagree“ (ZDF/arte, 2023) and the the science podcast „People of Science“ (Deutschlandfunk Kultur/arte, 2023). He also hosted the award-winning science documentary "How to build a bionic man" (Channel4, UK, 2013) and was part of "Homo Digitalis" (arte, 2019).
ARTIST: As an artist, Meyers makes dynamic, emotive house and techno with dancefloors in mind. His debut release ‘Walk The Night’ on DESSERT encapsulates his truly unique approach in the form of two club-ready productions, with a remix courtesy of Hannes Bieger. His second EP entitled ‚Where did the Day Go’ followed shortly after, with remixes by Mala Ika and Art Department’s Kenny Glasgow scheduled for later this year. In creative terms, Meyers prefers the controlled limitations of the modular over the overwhelmingly open-ended possibilities of a DAW. What makes his relationship with his modular setup unique is that Meyer is not only controlling it - he is an essential part of it:
Having found his original prosthetic hand impractical for controlling his modular setup, Meyer began researching the possibilities of improving his creative experience by essentially shortening the signal flow between mind and action. The result is what he refers to as his ‘Syn-limb’ - a hacked prosthetic built with the help of Christian Zollner at KOMA Elektronik and his husband Daniel Theiler, which allows Meyer to control some parameters of his modular setup with muscular signals sent directly from his mind.