MONDAY, OCTOBER 13 | 4:00 to 5:00 | AB100 | Free and Open to the Public

Focusing on Ebrahim Poustinchi and Studio EP’s design research and speculative work—spanning installations, exhibitions, and AR/VR experiments—this lecture explores the intersection of architecture/space, technology, media, robotics, and AI as mediums for designing and experiencing the world.

Grounded in Fuzzy Logic Theory and expanded through Poustinchi’s theory of Fuzzy Architecture, Fuzzy Cyborg World(s) aims to challenge the entrenched digital/physical and human/non-human binaries within the design and architecture world, provoking a spectrum of hybrid alternative spatial and experiential possibilities in between.

Learning Outcomes

  • Discover how architecture can be seen as a cultural practice through an interdisciplinary lens of world building.
  • Explore how emerging technologies like robotics, AR/VR, and AI are shaping design.
  • Understand the ideas and theories connecting this work to today’s architecture and design culture.
  • Leave with fresh perspectives on the relationship between humans, non-humans, technology, and the spaces we create, and many more topics!

BIO

Ebrahim Poustinchi is an award-winning designer, architect, curator, and inventor, a tenured Associate Professor of digital-design/architecture, and the founder/director of the Robotically Augmented Design (RAD) Lab at Kent State University, and the founding principal of Studio EP, an experimental design research practice. Additionally, from 2020 to 2022, Poustinchi served as the guest curator at the Architecture and Design (A+D) Museum in Los Angeles.

Poustinchi’s work focuses on the intersection of design/art, worldbuilding, space, media, technology, AI, and robotics, with an emphasis on an alternative reading of Animism and human/non-human dialogue through cyber-physical installations, UI/UX design, Human-Machine Interaction (HMI), AI, and physical computation and tangible/accessible interfaces for public audience.

Ebrahim is the inventor of two international patents in the field of creative robotics. He has widely lectured, taught workshops, and exhibited his work nationally/internationally. Poustinchi’s work has been disseminated worldwide in various galleries/museums and Journals/conferences, including the International Journal of Architectural Computing (IJAC), Journal of Engineering Technology (JET), ACADIA, CAADRIA, eCAADe, SIGraDi, ASCAAD, ASCA, the Akron Art Museum, the Akron Bicentennial Celebrations, the Museum of Moscow and Meyerhold Theatre Center in Russia, the Arab-American National Museum in Michigan, Jan-Koniarek Gallery in Slovakia, Fully-Booked Art-Fair in Dubai, and Levantine Cultural Center, Perloff Gallery, Architecture and Design (A+D) Museum in Los Angles, to name a few.

Poustinchi is the author/editor and art director of multiple books. His recent co-edited book, A Purple Architecture: Design in the Age of Physical-Virtual Continuum (Kerestes, Poustinchi, Vahdat 2024), published by Carnegie Mellon University ETC Press, was selected as the book of the year by the Next Generation Indie Book Awards in the art category.

For more information contact caplectures@bsu.edu.