DesignTalks 2022 - Stefán Laxness, architectural researcher and artist

Stefán Laxness, architectural researcher and artist is speaking at DesignTalks 2022, the international conference and signature event of DesignMarch, exploring how design and architecture can help imagine and propose alternative futures and promote change.

‘’With growing inequality, a continued reliance on market solutions to tackle the climate crisis and the consolidation of land for large estates, how can we avoid reproducing processes of spatial inequality?’’

Stefán Laxness is an architectural researcher and artist, formerly at the Turner Prize nominated research agency Forensic Architecture (FA), based at Goldsmiths, investigating human rights violations. His current work focuses on the political and cultural dimension of environmental restoration as a territorial project in Europe. Stefan was a 2020 European Media Art Platform (EMAP) resident has been exhibited internationally. He teaches an architecture studio (AA Diploma 9) at the Architectural Association in London, where he co-founded Pantopia.xyz, an online educational platform for spatial thinkers. His teaching explores the consequences and opportunities brought about by the climate crisis regarding how we inhabit and engage with our built environment. Previously, a project leader at FA, he led numerous projects, including the Ayotzinapa Case, developed methodologies for analysing airstrikes in the Middle East and modelling sites of human rights abuse from witness testimony. 

DesignTalks 2022 will take place in Harpa on the 4th of May and is curated by Hlin Helga Guðlaugsdóttir. This year the event will be moderated by Marcus Fairs, editor-in-chief and founder of Dezeen, connecting the conversations to a wider context, highlighting its relevance to an audience across professional fields.

The programme will be an exploration of resilient approaches, regeneration and reconnection with traditional crafts and indigenious wisdom, experiments rewiring and rethinking current systems, the design of data and information, extended realities and speculation into the future as a form of creative and critical reflection of the now.

“It will be a celebration of imagination - and a moment for deep thinking.”
- curator Hlin Helga

Stay tuned as we will announce the speakers for DesignTalks 2022!