In the 1440’s, Johannes Gutenburg’s invention of moveable type revolutionized book production and led to democratic flourishing of human information sharing. Today, Neri Oxman sees a new and equally powerful change happening with digital fabrication technologies. “3-D printing has brought about a revolution in design that is equivalent, perhaps, to the printing press,” Oxman says.

Oxman would like to know if we can do more than erect buildings and assemble goods — she’d like to grow them in ways that mimic nature. And her own award-winning objects and sculptural art reflect this approach. “If we can generate tools or technologies that grow materials — rather than subtract materials — then we can control lots of elements in that growth process,” she says. Imagine a skyscraper made with concrete that can breathe and grow and “think,” or consider a chair, which Oxman built, that moves with your body weight.

A visionary as much as she is an architect and designer, Neri Oxman imagines a future in which people can, “turn into material form any poetry that resides in the mind,” she says.

Oxman, a professor at the famed MIT Media Lab, will speak to these themes in the 2014 Aiken Lecture, “Material Ecology: A New Approach to Nature-Inspired Design & Engineering” at the University of Vermont’s Ira Allen Chapel, 5 p.m., Thursday, Oct. 2.

The event is free and open to the public.

Natural engineering

In traditional architecture and design, builders tend to work with elements that are mechanically assembled to create a larger function.  But, “in the natural world those larger functions are a result of growth,” Oxman says in a video. Her research group at MIT explores how digital design, engineering, material science, artistic forms, and ecology can combine to radically transform the design and construction of everyday objects, buildings and systems. This year, Oxman won the Vilcek Prize in Design.

“If nature is sustainable and beautiful," Oxman wonders in a 2013 story in Icon magazine, "how can we make things that are sustainable and beautiful?"

More Information

Neri Oxman is the Sony Corporation Career Development Professor, associate professor of media arts and sciences, and research group director at the MIT Media Lab, where she directs the Mediated Matter research group.

This year’s edition of the George D. Aiken Lecture is hosted by the University of Vermont’s College of Engineering and Mathematical Sciences.

Public parking for the lecture will be available in UVM’s Gutterson Garage after 3:30 p.m.