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Mr Ruairi Glynn
Associate Professor
The Bartlett School of Architecture
Faculty of the Built Environment
- Joined UCL
- 3rd Nov 2008
Research summary
Dr Ruairi Glynn's research practice is radically interdisciplinary. His doctoral thesis brought together the fields of psychophysics, cybernetics, cognitive psychology, robotics, puppetry, animation, interaction design and performance. His doctoral research looked at the uncanny sensation of life (anima) present in interactive objects and environments. Projects such as his own Fearful Symmetry commissioned for the inauguration of the Tanks at Tate Modern explored the very human impulse to anthropomorphise and build emotional relationships with things that move and interact with signs of intelligence.
As Director of the Interactive Architecture lab at the Bartlett School of Architecture, University College London, he has developed a masters programme and research group interested in the behaviour & the interaction of things, environments & their inhabitants. For more information visit www.interactivearchitecture.org
He has co-edited two books ‘Digital Architecture, Passages Through Hinterlands’ & ‘Fabricate, Making Digital Architecture’ in parallel to curating over a dozen international conferences, competitions and exhibitions. http://www.ruairiglynn.co.uk/publications/
He is co-founder and co-chair of FABRICATE - an International Peer Reviewed Conference & Publication
Teaching summary
Masters students within Dr Ruairi Glynn's Lab build and tests at 1:1 scale, experimental objects and interactive installations that uncover new design opportunities to sense and respond to the natural and built environment, to people and other living things, to data local and global. The work can be found at www.interactivearchitecture.org
He has run workshops and acted as visiting lecturer to leading centres of architectural and computational design research including ETH Zurich, TU Delft, CITA Copenhagen & Angewandte Vienna.
He has been teaching on Masters design programmes since 2007 in Architectural design, Textile and Industrial Design and Research. What brings these all together is his interest in designing interaction at scales from the micro/invisible to the architectural and urban. Coming from a background in sculpture at Central Saint Martins College London and a bachelor degree in Media Lab Arts from the University of Plymouth, Ruairi joined the Bartlett in 2005 studying his Diploma and Masters in Architecture which he graduated with distinction. He went on to exhibit his work internationally and publish a number of books as well as curate international conferences on the driving force of computation within architectural design.
Education
- University College London
- Doctorate, Doctor of Philosophy | 2019
Biography
Dr Ruairi Glynn practices as an installation artist and is Director of the Interactive Architecture Lab at the Bartlett School of Architecture, University College London. He is also the founder and Director of the Bartlett's new architectural master's programme called MArch Design for Performance & Interaction. He has exhibited internationally with recent shows at the Centre Pompidou Paris, the National Art Museum of China Beijing, and the Tate Modern, London. His interactive installations reflect on rapid developments in robotics, material science and computational technologies exploring the emerging aesthetics of behaviour permeating across art, architecture and design.
He has worked with leading cultural and research institutions including the Royal Academy of Arts, the Medical Research Council and BBC and built public installations for commercial clients including Twitter, Nike, Arup, Buro Happold, and Bank of America Merrill Lynch. He often works collaboratively with artists, architects and choreographers including Shobana Jeyasingh, Marshmallow Laser Feast, Studio Roso, onedotzero, Tellart, Haptic and Alma-nac Architects.