Biography
Dr Alberto Pugnale is an Architect and Senior Lecturer in Architectural Design at the Faculty of Architecture, Building and Planning of The University of Melbourne. He is a co-director of the Advanced Digital Design + Fabrication (ADD+F) Hub.
In 2003, he graduated in “Architecture Sciences” (Bachelor level) at Politecnico di Torino. In 2006 he graduated with Honours in “Architecture and Construction” (Master of Science level) at the same university, and in 2010 he got a PhD in “Architecture and Building Design”.
In 2007, he won the IASS HANGAI Prize, an international contest of research papers related to the field of shell and spatial structures for young researchers under 30. In 2008 he won a research scholarship granted by the ISI Foundation, Lagrange Project (Turin, Italy), related to the study of complex architectural and structural bodies. In 2023, he received the Tsuboi Award for the most meritorious paper published in the Journal of the IASS in the preceding calendar year.
From 2010 to 2012, he was Assistant Professor at Aalborg University, Denmark. He has been an invited lecturer in Italy, France, Switzerland, China, Mexico and the United States.
At present, he is a member of the ‘International Association for Shell and Spatial Structures’ (IASS) and of the ‘Society of Architectural Historians Australia and New Zealand’ (SAHANZ). He is also a reviewer for international journals and a member of the Editorial Board of the “Nexus Network Journal” and the “International Journal of Space Structures”.
TITLE
Collaboration scenarios between architects and artificial intelligence
SYNOPSIS
The impact of artificial intelligence advancements is visible in many fields. In architecture, artificial intelligence image-generation tools have enabled designers to produce compelling images through textual prompts, triggering critics to focus on issues of authorship and creativity of design outputs. The process goes into the background, and investigating the collaboration mechanisms between architects and machines loses its centrality. This presentation aims to restore continuity between the research conducted in artificial intelligence in design of the 90s and the current developments in the field by illustrating how recent applications of artificial intelligence can support designers in areas other than image generation. The approach embraced by this presentation favours artificial intelligence as a partner rather than a replacement for human creativity.