Joana Rafael is an architect practitioner and Postdoctoral Researcher, specializing in ecological concerns related to pollution and contamination, both indoors and in urban planning. Her research explores the intersections of architecture and urbanism with human geography, environmental studies, and power dynamics, encompassing contemporary culture, media studies, art, and technology. She investigates the materiality and limits of physical infrastructures in relation to Earth's systems and the reciprocal relationships between humans and nature, with a particular focus on radiologically contaminated environments. Joana has taught Contextual Studies and Contemporary Culture-related courses at institutions including ESAP in Porto, ISCE Douro in Penafiel, Central Saint Martins in London, and the University for the Creative Arts in Canterbury. She is a member of CEGOT (Center for Studies in Geography and Spatial Planning) and CEAA (Centro de Estudos Arnaldo Araújo), and a co-founder of REFINERY BOARD. Joana holds a Master of Architecture and Urban Cultures from Metropolis, Barcelona, as well as a Master of Research Architecture and a PhD in Visual Cultures from Goldsmiths, University of London. She also earned a Healthier Materials and Sustainable Building Specialization certificate from Parsons School of Design, The New School. In addition to her academic pursuits, Joana is a certified farmer.
Coll()sion
Self-published zine compiling MA thesis research in Research Architecture at Goldsmiths, London.
Titled coll[]sion, the zine focuses on the relation between two, seven days interval, event-accidents that happened one in the deep Sea and other in the Outer Space. Both presented as remarkable misfortunes and constructed as paradigmatic changes opened the door to the recognition of failure and to attempts to overcome (or improve) if not to silence and/or deceive. Positioning schemas of military behaviour, the privilege of relation to space and standards for prevailing techno-scientific developments to be socio-constructed, transformed or (re)invented, this work inquires how are international and relatively free spaces produced and by what means they interconnect forms of governance and/or dispute.
