Montreal Cultural Calendar

Design & Computation Arts Speaker Series featuring Dr. Carolina Espinoza Sanhueza. This lecture will present insights from research projects focused on improving indoor environmental quality in Northern localities. Dr. Espinoza Sanhueza is an architect, researcher, and educator dedicated to creating sustainable, carbon-neutral environments that place human well-being at their core. Her work integrates architectural design with environmental performance, using building parameters, light quality, indoor air quality, and thermal comfort, as levers for enhancing occupant health and spatial experience, specifically in Northern climates. Her research advances simulation-based methods, immersive visualization, and post-occupancy evaluation to support evidence-based design decision-making.

Thirty years later, we will commemorate JenniCam's anniversary with a day-long event about and through live streaming practices. Keynote lecture by Susanna Paasonen (online), plus an in-situ conversation. Snacks and beverages will be provided.

Second presentation of the Design & Computation Arts Speaker Series featuring Dr. Iva Rešetar, an architect and interdisciplinary researcher at the Cluster of Excellence Matters of Activity at the Humboldt-Universität zu Berlin. Iva Rešetar studied architecture at the University of Belgrade and the Städelschule in Frankfurt and received her doctorate from the Berlin University of the Arts' Department of Digital and Experimental Design. Her dissertation critically examines the relationship between architecture and environmental technologies, searching out historical and experimental knowledge of thermodynamic processes of phase change in architecture – how they are sensed, mediated and acted upon in context of the current climate crisis. Her interests lie in fluid materialities, methods and practices of energy and heat, and their implications for environmental regeneration and repair of the built environment. Recent publications include Breath: Morphological, Ecological and Social Dimensions (De Gruyter, 2022), and Thermodynamic Structures: Modulating Heat with Phase Change Materials in Architecture (Berlin University of the Arts, 2025).

w/ Dr. Meredith Bak, Dr. Caetlin Benson-Allott, and Pat Bonner. Respondant: Dr. Haidee Wasson. As film moves to television and television to our pockets, the material conditions of everyday media consumption appear once again to have changed. But not only are past and present media practices more varied, unpredictable, and historically-rooted, they also challenge the (still dominant) visual-centricism of spectatorship studies. Indeed, our sensory experiences (of sound, touch, smell, etc.) are shaped and stimulated by diverse material forms, emotional attachments, and expressive rituals. Drawing on cultural history, media archaeology, and ordinary media stuff, this panel reconsiders the present focus on smartphones, social media and streaming by exploring transformations in material media cultures since the 1980s: toy voice devices, comfort viewing, and interactive video. Together, these talks examine the cultural politics of media consumption in recent decades. Presentations: Meredith Bak - Talking Back: Mediating the 90s Child's Voice; Caetlin Benson-Allott - The Material Culture of Comfort Viewing; Pat Bonner - Video Kids: How Home Video Transformed (Canadian) Children's Television

Third presentation of the Design & Computation Arts Speaker Series featuring Zherui Wang. Zherui Wang is a designer and building technology researcher at the University of Pennsylvania Weitzman School of Design. His work focuses on devising architectural methods for cooling and climate-response design for extreme heat while being mindful of material use. Supported by the U.S. Department of Energy's ARPA-E program, his PhD research explores the design integration of structural form-finding and building thermal mass performance, informed by architectural geometry, materials science, and life cycle thinking. He is a co-author of Hydroculus, an evaporative and radiative cooling roof prototype that was exhibited in the Venice Architecture Biennale and received a Holcim Foundation Award for Sustainable Design and Construction. Previously, Wang was an Academic Professional Researcher at CHAOS Lab in Princeton. He has practiced in design roles at Barkow Leibinger Architects and served on the design faculty at the University of Pennsylvania, Pratt Institute, and State University of New York at Buffalo, where he was named the 2020-21 Reyner Banham Fellow. Wang holds a BArch from Pratt Institute, a post-professional MArch from Princeton University, and a graduate certificate in Energy Policy from the Penn Kleinman Center.

Training event at the end of a day-long event focused on learning various skills. The space is behind the main building so you need to walk outside to the left of the main building that faces the street until you see the sign for 'Recyborg'. This event will be similar to the other ones but it would be helpful to brush up on your skills before our spring campaign begins even if you've come before. This may be the last one before we begin doing the real grafting in May. There will be regular meetups throughout May and June but the plan is for none of them to be focused on learning how to do the technique, discussing the concept of guerrilla grafting, the reasons for doing it, etc. Having said that, if you fail to come to even a single training event, you are still welcome at the events in May and June.