Over two years, the Museum für Naturkunde underwent a process of change and reflection, moving towards an open, integrated research museum. This is not to say that the process is now complete.
To mark this new beginning, we have developed a new logo and corporate design to convey our views and values.
When talking about the Museum für Naturkunde, we usually don’t mean just the building, but also our thriving community of staff members. All of them were involved in shaping this transformation process on the basis of our common cause – nature. Für Natur is what we stand for, so we all signed with our names, and our signatures have become part of the logo. These signatures are meant to inspire beyond the Museum itself and encourage our visitors and politics and industry to reflect how they can contribute to the survival of nature.
We are the Leibniz Institute for Biodiversity and Evolution Research and stand in the tradition of great naturalists, such as Alexander von Humboldt, whose biography is closely linked with our history. His thinking has left its mark on our endeavour:
"Nature, seen through the intellect, is unity in diversity, the abundance that meets our senses in a variety of shapes and blends, the essence of things of nature and the forces of nature, as one living whole. The most important result of meaningful scientific research is therefore to recognise unity in the diverse, to comprehend in an individual everything that has been revealed to us through recent discoveries, scrutinise every detail without succumbing to the abundance of detail. We must not forget that it is man’s sublime destination to seize the spirit of nature that lies under the veil of its physical appearances. In this way, we can overcome the narrow world we experience through our senses and, by understanding nature, we may succeed in mastering the raw material of empirical study through our ideas."
– Alexander von Humboldt, Cosmos. First Volume
This is why his signature stands for all of us and the cause of nature.