Stefan Schreiber had studying Pre- and Protohistoric Archaeology, Medieval History and Medieval German Literature and Language at Humboldt University Berlin. In 2010 he wrote his M.A. thesis on the subject of “’Kulturelle Aneignungen’ als Strategien des Umgangs mit Dingen. Archäologische Betrachtungen zu einem kulturanthropologischen Modell“ (‚Cultural appropriation’ as a strategy of the handling of things. Archaeological reflections on a cultural anthropological model). Currently, he is working on his doctoral thesis on the topic “Wenn Dinge wandern: ‚Römische Funde’ in consumptionscapes, communities of practice und identity spaces im Barbaricum“ (Shifting Things: “Roman“ finds in the Barbaricum in consumptionscapes, communities of practice and identity spaces). His interests are archaeological and anthropological theories, material culture studies, gender theory, culture contact situations and agency theory. Epistemologically, he argues from a constructivist and posthumanist point of view.

Within her research project on geometric and archaic bronze finds in Olympia Susanne Bocher is studying how early Greek sanctuaries were organized and how they were influenced by local and regional impacts. Especially religious activities involving votives and rituals as well as their impact on the formation of collective identities are in her focus.

Susanne Bocher studied Prehistoric and Classical Archaeology as well as Geology at the Eberhard-Karls-University Tübingen and the University of Crete. Her PhD on geometric sheet-bronzes of Olympia was completed in 2010 and defended at the Ruprecht-Karls-University of Heidelberg. Since 2004 she has been working for the Olympia-Project at the German Archaeological Institute. Her current research project on early votives and their religious interpretation in the sanctuary of Olympia is part of the Project ‘Olympia and its environment’.  Since 2010 she is also involved in the Kalaureia-Project of the Swedish Institute in Athens, where she is studying and interpreting the metal finds.

Since 2003, Dominik Bonatz has served as a professor at the Institute for Ancient Near Eastern Studies of the Freie Universität Berlin. His academic career started early with doctoral research on Iron Age funerary monuments in the Syrian-Anatolian region. This research laid the foundations for his key interest in the study of ancient Near Eastern visual arts with a focus on the anthropology, performance and perception of images. As a Principle Investigator in Topoi he puts a new emphasis on this interest by investigating the modes of representing and ordering space, including social space, in the pictorial systems of ancient Near Eastern civilizations. While thus remaining active as an ‘art historian’ in his field Dominik Bonatz also heads two excavation projects, one in North Syria since 2005, the other on Sumatra in Indonesia since 2002. The results of the excavation in Syria contribute to an understanding of the territorial expansion of the Middle Assyrian Empire in the late second millennium BC. Taking a generalizing archaeological perspective from this project Dominik Bonatz inquires in another research area of Topoi into the material components which became the means of creating and structuring political space.