Designer, artist, and engineer. Merging an industry background in engineering and user experience design, an artist’s perspective, and a sci-fi obsession to create technologies in the service of mental and physical well-being.

Massachusetts Institute of Technology, Cambridge, MA
MS, Media Arts and Sciences, 2014
Advisor: Pattie Maes
Thesis: Out of Network: Technologies to Connect with Strangers

Rhode Island School of Design, Providence, RI
MFA, Digital + Media, honors, 2012
Advisor: Kelly Dobson
Thesis: Enraptured && Encoded

Brown University, Providence, RI
Sc.B. Applied Mathematics/Computer Science, magna cum laude, 2005

Tenure-track assistant professor of interaction design at the Penny Stamps School of Art and Design researching technologies for mental health. Designed syllabi and taught Sci-Fi Prototyping, Digital Fabrication (laser cutting, 3D printing, CNC milling, Rhino, Solidworks, etc.), and Creative Programming (Processing).

Designed syllabus and taught Science Fiction to Science Fabrication, a course on science fiction, prototyping, and the ethics of invention and design for graduate students at the MIT Media Lab and Harvard.

Designed syllabus and taught Human + Computer, a workshop series for MIT, RISD, and Brown students focused on wearables, human augmentation, and alternative communication devices. The course combined an introduction to the Arduino GSM module (used to make DIY cell phones), an overview of digital fabrication processes (laser cutting, CNC milling, 3d printing), critical and speculative design, and sci-fi readings culminating in an exhibition at RISD Exposé.

Designed syllabus and taught course combining science fiction, art theory readings, and studio work for graduates and undergraduates. Taught intro to programming (Processing) workshops for graduates in Digital + Media department and in Foundation Studies.

Managed Haystack’s Fab Lab and assisted instructors and students in applying digital fabrication processes (ShopBot, laser cutter, vinyl cutter, etc.) to traditional crafts.

Classes taught: How To Make Almost Anything (digital fabrication and electronics production), Intro to Creative Programming (Processing), Intro to Algorithms and Data Structures, Javanese Gamelan, and Head TA for Advanced Algorithms.

Fluid Interfaces Group with advisor Pattie Maes. Designed and fabricated a set of networked appliances and wearable devices based on Philip K. Dick’s empathy box.


Researched thin films in materials science/mechanical engineering departments.

Designed both hardware and software experience of a new health technology for a large medical company. Research, interaction design, and CAD.

Interned for Martin Wattenberg and Fernanda Viégas in Google Research. Designed and programmed (JavaScript/HTML5) an experimental visualization project.

Interned for CEO Eric Schmidt and Java founder Joshua Bloch. Designed user interface and implemented experimental prototype in Java.

Front-end engineer for iGoogle, Google's personalized homepage (22.5 million users and 20% of all visits to Google's homepage in 2008) and Google Gadgets. 7th engineer on iGoogle team. Designed and wrote some of the most popular Google Gadgets (millions of users). Worked closely with business partners including CBS, NY Times, Sports Illustrated, Entertainment Weekly, etc. writing and designing Google Gadgets and taught them to develop their own.

Designed and led workshop combining science fiction, ethical design, and art.


Presented at Google Developer Day in Tokyo and Google Developer Night in Seoul; gave many internal talks at Google offices all over the world; spoke at several universities in Japan. Overall, reached thousands of developers and students through these talks.

Eyeo Artist Fellowship, 2015
Signal Culture Toolmaker Residency, NY, 2015
Harold and Arlene Schnitzer Prize in the Visual Arts, MIT, 2014
Fellow, The Dalai Lama Center for Ethics and Transformative Values, 2013-current
Turbulence.org networked art commission (with Catherine D'Ignazio), 2012
RISD graduate fellowship and assistantship, 2011
NSF grant for AVAToL Ideas Lab (tree of life visualization), 2011
RISD graduate fellowship and assistantship, 2010
Google's EMG (Executive Management Group) Impact Award for outstanding innovation, 2008

Smithsonian Magazine, How America's Leading Science Fiction Authors Are Shaping Your Future
The Atlantic, Why Today's Inventors Need to Read More Science Fiction
Los Angeles Times, The MIT Media Lab Class That Makes Science Fiction Real
The Atlantic, The History of Invisibility Cloaks, as Told by People in the Future
Scientific American, Students Combine Arts and Science While Exploring "Transhumanism"
Fast Company, Take Note, Facebook: How Colleges Are Training Designers To Treat Users Like More Than Lab Rats
Huffington Post, When Science Fiction Gets Real
io9, At MIT, engineers are taught that scifi is crucial to do good science
The Creators Project, Brown, MIT, And RISD Are Implanting Art Into Their Transhumanist Experiments
Fast Company, Mad Scientist 101: A New MIT Class Aims To Turn Science Fiction Tech Into The Real Thing
Wired, Science Fiction to Science Fabrication
Fast Company, From MIT, An Interactive Book That Makes You Feel Characters' Pain
MIT Spectrum, Why Should Inventors Read Science Fiction?
Boston Magazine, What If Books Physically Replicated the Protagonist's Emotions?
Providence Business News, R.I., Mass. students collaborate on STEAM
Sci-Fi to Sci-Fab TV interview, Sky News, UK
MIT News, MIT students win annual Schnitzer Prize in the visual arts
The Harvard Crimson, Motion Picture
Rhizome, Locative Media Revisited
Hackaday, Play Music With Your Painting
Synthopia, Sophia Brueckner's Touch Sensitive Musical Painting

Sci-fi to Sci-fab radio interviews:
Studio 360, WNYC, NPR, At MIT, An Ethics Class for Inventors
Digital Culture, KPFK 90.7 FM Digital Village Radio, Sci-Fi to Sci-Fab: Bringing Science Fiction to Inventors
The Shift, CKNW, Vancouver
WGN Radio, Chicago
Newstalk Radio Ireland
Wisconsin Radio News, WTMJ
Ripley's Believe It or Not
Sensory Fiction on Wait, Wait, Don't Tell Me, NPR

WEB EXTRA: Bemis Underground's Transceiver: Drift Station, KVNO News
Lincoln Calling, The Reader

Shaker Traditions Contemporary Translations, Canterbury Shaker Village, NH
Altered Books: Digital Interventions, ACM SIGGRAPH
Signal from Noise, CCS Bard Galleries and Hessel Museum of Art, NY
+/- , Joseloff and Slipe Galleries, Hartford Art School, CT
Stimulus – Response – Affect (art exhibition and symposium), Oakland University, MI
Print Screen International Digital Culture Festival, Holon Cinematheque, Israel

Sound/System, Peabody Essex Museum, Salem, MA
Schnitzer Award Exhibition, Wiesner Gallery, Cambridge, MA
Crossover, Boston Cyberarts Gallery, Boston, MA
COLLISION20:bilocate, Boston Cyberarts Gallery, Boston, MA
OPENSIGNAL Festival, Brown University, Providence, RI
The Emperor's New Aesthetic, Emmanuel Gallery, Denver, CO

Pixels to Paper, Infrared5, Boston, MA
Video Snack, Bogart Street Studios, Brooklyn, NY
Phases, Boston Harbor Islands Pavilion, Boston, MA
iSkyTV, Turbulence, http://www.turbulence.org
The Other Festival, MIT Media Lab, Cambridge, MA
Circumtext, Fictilis, Portland, OR

#101112, Spacebar Gallery, Linz, AT
Brunel Electronic and Analogue Music (BEAM) Festival, London, UK
Showcase / The Thesis Book, Sol Koffler Gallery, Providence, RI
RISD MFA Thesis Show, Providence, RI
COLLISION17:transformer, AXIOM Center for New and Experimental Media, Boston, MA
From This Point Forward, Gelman Gallery, Providence, RI
SONiKFest, Brooklyn, NY
Fonlad Digital Arts Festival, Portugal
Transceiver, Bemis Center for Contemporary Art, Lincoln, NE
Transceiver, Drift Station Gallery, Lincoln, NE
The First Show, Multiplexer, Las Vegas, NV
Mediated Realities, Cohen Gallery, Providence, RI
Come Here, I Need You, Gelman Gallery, Providence, RI
Older Than Bambi, Sol Koffler Gallery, Providence, RI
Or a Motel, EiM Gallery, Toronto, Canada
basic.fm April radio programme, The Pixel Palace, UK
Mirror Images, Kreft Gallery, Ann Arbor, MI

GLI.TC/H, Amsterdam, NL
GLI.TC/H, Chicago, IL
Chopped & Stretched, Drift Station Gallery, Lincoln, NE
On the Threshold of Something Else, Something Other..., Sol Koffler Gallery, Providence, RI

Framed, solo show at Scout, Santa Cruz, CA
Group show at Cabrillo College, Santa Cruz, CA
Student Exhibition 4, Cabrillo College Gallery, Santa Cruz, CA
Student Exhibition 3, Cabrillo College Gallery, Santa Cruz, CA

C/C++, JavaScript, HTML5, Java, Python, Cinder, openFrameworks, Processing, OpenGL, Kinect, openCV, Max/MSP, Arduino, FLEX/ActionScript, MatLab, AVR embedded programming

SolidWorks, Inventor, AutoCAD, Rhino, Linux, Adobe Creative Suite, GIMP, Inkscape

CNC milling, Shopbot, laser cutting, waterjet cutting, vacuum forming, electronics production, 3d printing/scanning

Molding and casting, sewing, woodworking, metalworking, glass flameworking

Polish, French

Lead rock climber, both traditional and sport

Banjo, fingerstyle guitar, classical piano