Meet our new Pro-Rector and Vice-Rector
22. September, 2021
With effect from 1 August, The Oslo School of Architecture and Design (AHO) presents a new Pro-Rector for Education and a new Vice-Rector for Research. These two positions were created after the School recently underwent an academic restructuring in order to further strengthen and develop the School’s educational and research activities. You can become better acquainted with them here.
Pro-Rector for Education
The position of Pro-Rector for Education has been filled by Espen Surnevik. He has been affiliated with the AHO in a teaching capacity since 2009 and has recently been the Head of the Institute of Architecture. Espen also runs his own architectural practice and has developed projects such as Våler Church in Hedmark (2015) and Østre Porsgrunn Church in Telemark (2019). However, his most internationally published project is probably his small PAN Treetop Cabin project in Åsnes (2017).
"I have a small but exploratory architectural practice that prepares projects which are designed to interact with specific construction sites, their history, cultural identity, landscape and local climate. The relationship between the contemporary and universal versus the regional and traditional is a main field of research that is common to all these projects," he says.
Espen has been focussing mainly on the field of architecture, but he is now looking forward to being able to work more purposefully on all three educational programmes at the AHO.
"I grew up among committed landscape architects, and the way in which I relate to cultural and natural landscapes is also a key aspect of my relationship with the field of architecture. When it comes to design, this has many facets such as interactive design, but this subject also has a strong relationship with architecture and vice versa. I am very much looking forward to being able to work with common and individual framework conditions in order to achieve unity in respect of these three disciplines at a time when they are undergoing major changes in our changing society," says Espen.
He sees the strengths of the longstanding tradition that the AHO has enjoyed in the bond which exists between teaching and actually practicing what the subjects convey.
"I believe in constantly focusing on strengthening these aspects of education and, for example, seeking to actually learn how to build a good building in the architecture programme. The school already has a great educational milieu that needs to be cultivated and also provided with the conditions necessary for further development. I am a big fan of the fact that the AHO is an academy with a wide range of teachers who represent different points of view and perspectives," says Espen.
Vice-Rector for Research
Our new Vice-Rector for Research is Lise Amy Hansen. She is an Associate Professor at the Institute of Design. She studied at Central Saint Martins and then did her Master's degree at the Royal College of Art in London, after which she started her own design studio and worked extensively with culture, theatre, dance and urban regeneration. While running her studio she also taught at Central Saint Martins for several years before returning home after spending 13 years in London. Lise holds a PhD in Interaction Design from the AHO entitled "Communicating movement – full-body movement as a design material for digital interaction".
"After my PhD, I continued to conduct research on code and choreography through movement-based digital media," she says.
Since 2016 she has been working at the AHO on developing design theory and design-driven research at the Design Institute, as well as through a number of research and innovation projects, ranging from work inclusion and visualisation of kinaesthetic experiences to the development of interaction and service design methodology."I look forward to being able to support research across AHO. Our disciplines have a natural tendency to push boundaries and it is exciting to work on ensuring the freedom of research whilst working on strengthening the premises and structures that support outstanding research," says Lise.
The AHO has an active research milieu and contributes to many international research projects. Lise is looking forward to being able to communicate more about what we do.
"The AHO develops a lot of knowledge in the studio and in collaboration with others, as well as in national and international research projects and we could communicate and present more about what we do. Our research results are also beyond what we might call traditional research outcomes, and we have a potential in looking look at how we develop knowledge in our disciplines and how that knowledge in turn may be communicated," she says.
