Enric Ruiz-Geli

The work of architect Enric Ruiz-Geli is widely known for its use of ground-breaking technology. At Watermill, Ruiz-Geli discusses his approach to technology and its power to transform architecture and cities, citing the work of Buckminster Fuller as well as his firm’s own project at the Coney Island Aquarium. Founder of Cloud9 Architecture Studio and Curator of the Spanish Pavilion in the recent Architecture Biennal of São Paulo, Enric Ruiz-Geli has worked as the Co-Director of Metapolis and the Associate Set Designer to Robert Wilson. His professional practice and creative process are invested in experimentation. His scenography, ephemeral architecture, exhibitions, interventions, and events investigate and experiment with new forms of communication. Resulting from these investigations, he produces prototypes and “case studies” with the intended goal of realizing digital architecture in the “real” world. Ruiz-Geli’s projects have been presented at Archilab, the Venice Biennale, the São Paulo Biennal, MARQ: Buenos Aires Ministerio de Fomento, Madrid in the MACBA (Barcelona), and in the AedesBerlin. Ruiz-Geli’s work has been featured in Verb, A+U, GAHOUSES, MARK, Quaderns, Domus, Interni, ON, Thames & Hudson, WIRED, WALLPAPER, and The New York Times. Ruiz-Geli’s project “Habitat Hotel” is represented in the current exhibition Home Delivery: Fabricating the Modern Dwelling at MoMA. He has lectured at Columbia University and the American Institute of Architects. In 2007, Cloud9 won a competition for the redesign of the New York Aquarium on Coney Island. Most recently, his groundbreaking private commission “VILLA NURBS” was featured in a feature article in theNew York Times Magazine. This lecture is supported by the New York Council for the Humanities and the National Endowment for the Humanities.