Josef Früchtl (https://www.uva.nl/profiel/f/r/j.fruchtl/j.fruchtl.html) is professor of philosophy with a focus on philosophy of art and culture (Critical Cultural Theory) at the University of Amsterdam (UvA). He is publishing in the field of aesthetics (with a focus on aesthetics and ethics as well as aesthetics and politics), Critical Theory, theory of Modernity, and philosophy of film. His recent publication is Vertrauen in die Welt. Eine Philosophie des Films (München: Fink 2013), translated as Trust in the World. A Philosophy of Film (New York & London: Routledge 2018).

Natalie Scholz is Assistant Professor of Modern and Contemporary History at the University of Amsterdam. She works on the cultural history of the political in modern Europe (France and Germany) with a focus on symbolic representations, popular imaginations and their affective dimensions. In her book Die imaginierte Restauration (Wissenschaftliche Buchgesellschaft 2006) she interpreted popular imaginations of the French Restoration Monarchy as cultural expressions of political feelings framed in a melodramatic mode. Currently she is working on a book project about the political meanings of every-day objects in postwar West Germany.