University at Buffalo Professor of Architecture and director of UB’s Center for Inclusive Design and Environmental Access (IDeA Center), Edward Steinfeld, co-chaired The International Conference on Best Practices in Universal Design with his son, Aaron Steinfeld, a systems scientist at Carnegie Mellon University’s Robotics Institute, and Peter Blanck, chair of Syracuse University’s Burton Blatt Institute. This was one of six conferences that took place in Toronto between June 5 and June 8 as part of the 2011 Festival of International Conferences on Caregiving, Disability, Aging and Technology (FICCDAT).  The three-day universal design conference covered subjects including housing and home modifications, along with public building, community environments and public transportation. Steinfeld and Kate Seelman of the University of Pittsburgh gave the opening keynote based on “Enabling Environments”, their chapter in the recently released World Health Organization’s World Report on Disability. Beth Tauke, Associate Professor of Architecture at the University at Buffalo, presented “Bridging the Gap: Using Architecture & Social Justice to Increase Access to UD” and the “Universal Design Identity Program”, as well as two poster sessions including “The LIFEhouse™: A Sense-ible Home for ALL of Life” and Finding a New Lockwood: Multi-sensory wayfinding in a university library”.

Stephanie Davidson and Georg Rafailidis participated in the International Architecture Festival Eme 3 in Barcelona from July 1 to July 3. They exhibited their project “Selective Insulation,” gave a lecture and took part in a debate about “sustainability vs. greenwashing.” For more information:
http://eme3.org/index.php?/program-eme320/program/
http://eme3.org/index.php?/eme32011/participants2011/. “Selective Insulation was also published in “ARCHITECTURE LOW COST, LOW TECH,” Actes Sud, 2011, and in “Inventario” 02.

Prof. Rafailidis also published “Cafe Culture in an Era of Precarious Employment,” by Tonya Davidson and Georg Rafailidis in Canadian Dimension Volume 45, Issue 2 May/June 2011. And Stephanie Davidson is also participating in the 63rd Rochester-Finger Lakes Exhibition at the Memorial Art Gallery, Rochester, NY from July 24 to September 25.

Dr. Jean La Marche conducted a graduate studio in the Material Culture Group in the spring term. Students designed and constructed four towers at Griffis Sculpture Park in western New York. The 1st year students also designed and built their final semester project, the “Living Wall,” at Griffis Park: http://www.griffispark.org.

Dennis Maher completed a new installation at the Pittsburgh Center for the Arts as part of the Pittsburgh Biennial. The Biennial is a collaboration between the PCA, the Warhol Museum, the Carnegie Museum, and the Miller Gallery at Carnegie Mellon: http://biennial.pittsburgharts.org/. Prof. Maher has also been selected to be the next Artist-in-Residence at the Albright Knox Art Gallery, Buffalo, NY. His forthcoming project, “The Real and the Unreal House,” will open at the Albright Knox in 2013.

Robert Garlow, a graduate student in the Material Culture Group, was one of seven finalists in Art Park, New York sculpture competition.

MJ Carroll, a graduate student in the Inclusive Design Group, won the 2011 AIA New York State Student Award.