UTSA College of Architecture presents first lecturer from China in fall series

Architect Erhard An-He Kinzelbach and a building design project
(Photos: Copyright Kronaus Kinzelbach)

By Nicole Chavez
Development Assistant, College of Architecture

(Nov. 29, 2011) -- Erhard An-He Kinzelbach, a licensed architect in Austria and Germany and professor at the China Academy of Art in Hangzhou, will present the fourth and final installment of the UTSA College of Architecture Fall Lecture Series. Associated with the rising generation of Asian architects trained in the West, Kinzelbach works internationally and is the first guest lecturer for the lecture series from China.

>> Free and open to the public, Kinzelbach will speak on "Differentiation and Repetition: Recent Projects" at 5:30 p.m., Wednesday, Nov. 30 in the Buena Vista Street Building Aula Canaria (1.328) at the UTSA Downtown Campus.

Kinzelbach studied architecture and urbanism at Darmstadt University of Technology in Germany, ETH Zurich in Switzerland and Columbia University in New York. He received a Diplom-Ingenieur (or Dipl.-Ing., a traditional German engineering degree) in Architecture and Urbanism with distinction from TU Darmstadt and a Master of Science in Advanced Architectural Design degree from Columbia, where he graduated with honors. After earning his degree at Columbia, Kinzelbach worked on the Bundle Tower project (new World Trade Center, New York) as a project designer for Foreign Office Architects, then became a project architect for the Office for Metropolitan Architecture in New York.

In 2004, Kinzelbach founded Knowspace Architecture + Cities. A New York-based studio for practice and research on architecture and cities, Knowspace is a moderator and organizer of the complex interactions that determine a project including cultural, political, economic and material components and multiple agents.

Kinzelbach served as an assistant professor at the Academy of Fine Arts Vienna in the Institute for Art and Architecture from 2004 to 2008 before joining the China Academy of Art in Hangzhou in 2010.

A globally practicing architect with strong ties to the modern architectural culture in influential Asian cities such as Beijing and Shanghai, Kinzelbach's substantial professional work often focuses on societal and cultural issues. He served as the director of the China Academy of Art research team for sustainable neighborhoods, a recent global project in which BMW i (BMW's new, all-electric sub-brand of cars) and Wallpaper magazine explored how design and technology will keep the megacities of the future moving. BMW i and Wallpaper provided funding to six universities in major cities worldwide, asking student teams to envision the future of mass transit and the urban streetscape it will serve.

Kinzelbach has additional experience working on housing projects for the elderly in Austria. In fall 2010, he was a speaker at the New Aging Conference, hosted by the University of Pennsylvania School of Design, where he presented his innovative architectural solutions for the rapidly growing over-65 population.