This lesson examines contemporary artistic practices that negotiate historical legacies, extant socio-political structures, and the agency of matter. Projects addressing colonial expropriation and the restitution of cultural property are discussed through the work of artists like Kader Attia, and Roman Himey & Yarema Malashchuk, and initiatives surrounding the Benin Bronzes, including the Savoy-Sarr Report, confronting the ethical, symbolic, and material dimensions of cultural restitution. Artistic projects investigating and imagining other collective political and economic infrastructures, like in the work of Kathrin Böhm, Ahmet Öğüt, Jonas Staal, Cooking Sections, Jatiwangi Art Factory, and INLAND, are analysed in relation to precarity, resource inequality, and the social and environmental stakes of late capitalism. The lesson also examines practices primarily focused on materiality, process, and sensory experience. Sculptural and object-oriented interventions by Andres Anza, Heechan Kim, Zsófia Keresztes, Daniel Otero Torres, Berlinde De Bruyckere, and Barthélémy Toguo use tactility, corporeality, and temporal modulation to engage memory, embodiment, and social experience. Textile-based practices and performative interventions by Ernesto Neto, Sarah Zapata, Milica Dukic, Mataaho Collective, Hangama Amiri, Güneş Terkol, and Emma Talbot mobilize weaving, spatialization, and audience participation to articulate collective identity, historical consciousness, and material resistance. Finally, the success of contemporary painting is examined through the work of Julie Mehretu, Oscar Murillo, Kerstin Brätsch, Sol Calero, Kudzanai Chiurai, Sun Yitian, Patrizio di Massimo, and Njideka Akunyili Crosby.