Research Statement
My research and pedagogical practice are predominantly directed towards experiments in Mixed Reality (MR/XR), through which I address and bridge the current, vast gaps existing between design methodologies used in physical and digital space. The world is increasingly mixed and trans—and truthfully, always has been—and while our process and procedures are equally mixed, all too often still the outcomes of such processes seldom reflect this hybrid physical, digital state of spaces, bodies and objects. With my work and teaching, I address this multifaceted discrepancy outright, through what I refer to as “Puppet Pedagogies,” an agile framework which instrumentalizes Digital Puppetry and Digital Twinning to recontextualize the design of digital spaces and objects in ways that are overtly embodied and geared towards immersive physicality.
Research Keywords
- Virtual Reality
- Video Games
- Speculative Embodiment
- Spatial Computation
- Somatics
- Robotics
- Queer Ecology
- Puppetry
- Play
- Mixed Reality
- Live Simulations
- Gender
- Games
- Extended Reality
- Disability
- Digital and Physical Trash
- Digital Twinning
- Digital Puppetry
- Design
- Crip Time
- Computation
- Augmented Reality
- Architecture
- Animacy
Presentations
- Parametric Truth: Standards and Status Quos with Simone Niquille, Amsterdam Academy of Architecture, Amsterdam, Netherlands. Invited Talk/Keynote, Presented, 02/28/2024.
- "Mixed Reality, Nonbinary Tech." 8th Annual Digital Humanities Utah (DHU8) Conference. Presentation, Presented, 02/24/2024.
- architectures of planetary well-being, Podcast, Interview and Conversation alongside artist Lawrence Lek, hosted by re:arc institute and KoozArch. Invited Talk/Keynote, Presented, 02/01/2024.
- Generations: Perspectives in Computational Design, Symposium hosted by Mario Carpo, Institute of Architecture of die Angewandte with the MAK - Museum of Applied Arts, Vienna, Austria. Invited Talk/Keynote, Presented, 06/02/2023.
- Trash Talk, Lecture Series and Panel Discussion alongside Tizziana Baldenebro from SPACES, College of Architecture and Environmental Design (CAED), Kent State University, Kent, OH. Invited Talk/Keynote, Presented, 04/14/2023.
- TRANS-SCALAR(S), Lecture Series, Hines College of Architecture and Design, University of Houston, Texas. Invited Talk/Keynote, Presented, 03/20/2023.
Publications
- Leah Wulfman (2024). “Collaborative Game Simulation and Toxic Embodiment in the Anthropocene”, The Image Was Never Flat Book. Routledge. Accepted, 05/01/2024.
- Leah Wulfman (2024). “Oh Shit I Took Both Pills, and Now Architecture is NO LONGER Frozen Music!!”, Architecture & Video Games Book. Routledge. Accepted, 03/01/2024.
- Leah Wulfman (2023). "And Performing Objects”, Out in Architecture Book. . Self-Published. Published, 10/09/2023.