UNIVERSITY PARK, Pa. — A virtual lecture from artist and architect Yussef Agbo-Ola, founding principal of Olaniyi Studio, will kick off the College of Arts and Architecture’s Stuckeman School’s spring 2024 Lecture + Exhibit Series at 4:30 p.m. on Feb. 27.

 Titled “The Art of Poetic Environmental Architecture and Design,” Agbo-Ola’s lecture will highlight the importance of the ephemeral, entropy in design and poetic environmental architecture relating to his work over the last decade. Attendees are encouraged to watch the virtual lecture in the Stuckeman Family Building Jury Space. The lecture will also be available to attend via Zoom.

Agbo-Ola founded his own London-based environmental art, architecture and design studio, Olaniyi Studio, “to expand environmental awareness through design creativity, collective collaboration, and speculative imagination.” He is an artist and medicinal architect living between London, Lagos and the Amazon Forest. Born in a multicultural household in rural Virginia, his work reflects hybrid identities and relationships to different landscapes, ecologies and cultural rituals.\

Agbo-Ola’s artistic practices feature natural energy systems and interactive experiments that explore the connections between an array of sensory environments. His practice questions how art, architecture and anthropological research can create experimental environments that challenge how we experience geological conditions and living ecosystems. His works manifest as architectural temples, photographic journalism, material alchemy, interactive performance, experimental sound design and conceptual writing. 

Agbo-Ola is also an adjunct assistant professor of architecture at Columbia University’s Graduate School of Architecture, Planning and Preservation where he directs an experimental design studio titled, “The Art of Poetic Environmental Architecture.” He holds a master of fine art from the University of the Arts London and a master of architecture from the Royal College of Art.

Agbo-Ola has led art and architectural commissions for the United Nations, Institute of Contemporary Art (London), Serpentine Gallery London, Van Abbe Museum, TEDx East End, British Broadcasting Corporation Arts, Museum Folkwang, Venice Architectural Biennials, Palais de Tokyo, Tai Kwun Arts Center, Sharjah Architecture Triennial and Lexus Automotive Innovation Centre Japan, among others.

Events in the Stuckeman School Lecture + Exhibit Series are free and open to the public.