MsJoanne Kinniburgh

My research operates between architecture, performance and Connection to Country, with a focus on possible futures for art, architecture and the built environment on Aboriginal Country. In my research, I relate architecture and representations of Country to larger political and historical contexts through a critical spatial practice (Rendell). My work challenges the colonial/European domination of confiscated Aboriginal land for contemporary architecture, by working in the cultural margins (hooks, 1989). I am a doctoral candidate working on a thesis entitled Subjunctive Spatial Futurity: Dharawal Refusal (Hi)Stories of Country.

As a practitioner and educator, I am passionate about challenging colonial urban planning and conservative capitalist politics for city development, by drawing on Aboriginal knowledges of Country, concealed (hi)stories and the existing agency of community and local urban fabric. I am a Director at Bangawarra with Sydney Traditional Owner Dr Shannon Foster, where we work to embed the on-Country Spatial implications of Aboriginal Ancestral and ethnobotanical knowledges into the built environment. As an academic in the School of Architecture at University of Technology Sydney (UTS) since 2007, I coordinate design studios for the Masters of Architecture that centre Country. I have also taught Undergraduate design studios and construction, with a focus on the manifestation of critical design intent through material practice.

I have studied at the University of Otago, Aarhus Universitetet (exchange), Victoria University, and UTS.