Dr. Maria da Piedade Ferreira
Dr. Maria da Piedade Ferreira MSc (*1983, Lisboa, Portugal) is an architect, performance artist, educator, researcher and curator. Her doctoral thesis, “Embodied Emotions: observations and experiments in architecture and corporeality” (2016) coins her concept of Corporeal Architecture. Her artistic research practice takes place in academia and is focused on developing corporeal awareness in future designers through performance art. Her work explores the connections between Architecture, Neuroscience, Performance Art and Creativity and has been published and presented in international journals and venues, including the ANFA – Academy for Neuroscience and Architecture and the University IUAV di Venezia. Her work has involved collaborations with institutions such as MIT, TUM and ETH Zürich. She currently teaches Corporeal Architecture, Design, Ergonomics and Design History at the Hochschule für Technik Stuttgart – HFT. In 2020, as a response to COVID-19, she founded the YouTube channel Corporeal Architecture, a curatorial project that works as an Open-Access education and exhibition room which archives and preserves conversations, lectures, performances and artistic research outcomes with the goal to trigger transformation processes by bringing awareness on the interconnections between learning, play and creativity to a wider audience. Her curatorial work is archived at the YouTube channel Corporeal Architecture.