2021 ACSA/EAAE Teachers Conference

Elisa Cristiana Cattaneo
Adj. Prof. of Landscape Design, Politecnico di Torino, Politecnico di Milano
Visiting Scholar, Massachusetts Institute of Technology
Visiting Scholar, Graduate School of Design, Harvard University
Founder of O-n_ Experiments in Weakness Theory
Co-Founder and Director of B.L.U.E. Building Landscape Urbanism

Elisa Cristiana Cattaneo researches experimental ecological design and its theoretical implications. In particular, considering the design as a “weak” field evolvable and renewable through new transdisciplinary approaches, in particular between art and science.

She is founder and director of an independent research agency Weakcircus, active in studies, research, and project development in contemporary design within the Theory of Weakness.

In 2009, she completed a PhD in Architectural and Urban Design. In 2010, she was Visiting Scholar at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology. In 2011-2012, she was Visiting Scholar at the Graduate School of Design, Harvard University.

In this line of import-export researches, she recognized Landscape as the last step of the sequence Space – Place – Context (Loaded Void. City Theories since 1956, Maggioli Publisher). Research has found an outcome in monographs of excellent figures, in particular in Andrea Branzi (Andrea Branzi: E=mc2. The Project in the Age of relativity, Actar Publisher, 2019), which highlighted the importance of the North American criticism on the figure of the Italian artist/designer in relation to Nature and the city.

In 2015, she was co-curator of the session Landscape and the City at the Expo 2015 Architecture Pavilion six-months programme Milan, Capital of the Modern, by Regione Lombardia and Triennale di Milano, hosted in the Grattacielo Pirelli, Milan.

In 2019, she was co-editor of the book Prato Fabbrica Natura, and co-curator of the exhibition Verde Prato (Pecci Museum for the Contemporary Art).

She was co-founder with Richard Ingersoll of Terraviva and Earth Service program for ecological and agricultural developing in urban contexts. She is co-founder and co-director of B.L.U.E., international platform of research on landscape as new strategy for contemporary cities.

She is adj. professor of Landscape Architecture at the Politecnico di Torino and Milan.

Since 2002, she has been the principal of her firm, active in public projects and international competitions.

Philippe Rahm
Principal, Philippe Rahm architectes

Philippe Rahm (born in 1967) is a swiss architect (M.Arch EPFL, Ecole Polytechnique F.d.rale de Lausanne in 1993 and Ph.D University of Paris-Saclay in 2019), principal in the office of “Philippe Rahm architectes”, based in Paris, France. His work, which extends the field of architecture from the physiological to the meteorological, has received an international audience in the context of sustainability. He has taught architecture design at the GSD, Harvard University, USA, from 2014 to 2016. In 2002, Mr. Rahm was chosen to represent Switzerland at the 8th Architecture Biennale in Venice, and was one of the 25 Manifesto’s Architects of Aaron Betsky’s 2008 Architectural Venice Biennale. He participates in 2017 at the Architecture Biennales of Chicago and Seoul. His recent work includes the first prize for the Farini competition in Milan in 2019, a masterplan for a 62 hectares new district and a 15 hectares park, the First Prize in 2011 for the 70 hectares Taichung Gateway Park (Jade Eco Park / Central Park) in Taiwan, completed in 2020, the First Prize for the 1800 m2 Agora of the French National Radio in Paris, a 2700 m2 Exhibition architecture for the Luma Foundation in Arles, France. Monographic books “Environ(ne)ment: Approaches for Tomorrow”, published by Skira in 2006, “Architecture m.t.orologique” published by Archibooks in 2009, “Constructed atmospheres” published by Postmedia, Milan, Italy, in 2014 and “Form follows Climate” published by OFL in 2017, “Le Jardin M.t.orologique” published by B2 in France. He has received the Silver Medal of the French Academy of Architecture in 2019 and was made a knight of the Order of Cultural Merit of Monaco in 2017. He has participated in a number of exhibitions worldwide (SF-MoMA 2001; Centre Pompidou, Paris, 2003-2006 and 2007; Louisiana museum, Denmark, 2009; Guggenheim Museum, New-York 2010, Maxxi, Rome 2014). In 2007, he had a personal exhibition at the Canadian Centre for Architecture in Montreal and in 2018 at the San Francisco Art Institute. Mr. Rahm was a resident at the Villa Medici in Rome (2000). He has held professorships at the AA School in London (2005-2006), Mendrisio Academy of Architecture in Switzerland (2004 – 2005), ETH Lausanne (2006 – 2007), School of Architecture of the Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts of Copenhagen (2009-2010), in Oslo at the AHO (2010-2011), at Columbia University (2016) and currently at Cornell University. From 2010 to 2012, he held the Jean Labatut Professorship in Princeton University, USA. He is currently a tenured associate professor at the National Superior School of Architecture in Versailles, France (ENSA-V). He has lectured widely, including at Yale, Beijing Forum, UCLA and the ETH Zürich. In 2020, he is the curator and author of the exhibition and book “Natural History of Architecture” at the Pavillon de l’Arsenal in Paris.

Kotchakorn Vorrakhom
CEO and Founder of Landprocess and Porous City Network

Kotchakorn Voraakhom is a landscape architect from Thailand who works on building productive green public space that tackles climate change in urban dense areas and climate-vulnerable communities.

Opened in 2017, Chulalongkorn Centenary Park is the first critical piece of green infrastructure in Bangkok to reduce urban flood risk. With on-site water management, the park can collect, treat, and hold up to one million gallons of water, alleviating overwhelmed public sewage during heavy rainfall. In 2019, Thammasat Urban Rooftop Farm, Asia’s largest, was opened. Landprocess repurposed wasted rooftop space to address food and water scarcity in preparation for future climate challenges. In 2020, Chao Phraya Sky Park was realized. Once an inaccessible and incomplete sky railway, the old ruins are now whole, becoming the first realized bridge park to cross a river in any capital city in the world.

Voraakhom is featured in 2019, TIME 100 Next, a list from TIME Magazine —that spotlights 100 rising stars who are shaping the future of the world. She is also on the list of 15 women fighting against climate change from TIME. This year she was named BBC100 Women, the Green 30 for 2020 by Bloomberg. Recently, she got an award from United Nations as Winners of the 2020 UN Global Climate Action Awards, Women for Results. Voraakhom is a Chairwoman of the Climate Change Working Group of the International Federation of Landscape Architects (IFLA World), TED Fellow, Echoing Green Climate Fellow, Atlantic Fellow. She received her master’s in landscape architecture from Harvard University’s Graduate School of Design.

Image Credit: Fee – Gloria Groenemeyer