Dr Rujana Rebernjak

Biography

I am a cultural historian with a specialist interest in histories of design, architecture, visual and material culture in Eastern Europe under socialist rule.
My research examines the relationship between politics, architectural and design practice in post-war socialist Yugoslavia, examining the way designers and architects shaped the experience of workers' self-management - the key feature of Yugoslav "third way" socialism. My research has been published in journals and edited volumes, and I am currently finalising my first book titled "Designing the Everyday: the Material Culture of Self-Management in Post-War Yugoslavia".

I hold a PhD in History of Design from the Royal College of Art/V&A museum. Prior to joining the LCC as Senior Lecturer and Leader in Contextual and Theoretical Studies, I taught at a number of UK universities, and worked with cultural institutions and organisations as curator of public programmes, editor, writer and consultant (amongst these Apartamento magazine, Alla Carta magazine, Museum of Architecture, the Venice Biennale). My research has been funded by the AHRC, Design History Society, and the Frankopan Fund.

I welcome PhD applications from potential students interesting in researching the following areas: socialist and post-socialist design and architectural history; critical studies of science and technology; medical humanities and design; environmental design and design for the climate crisis; critical and speculative design practices; material culture studies; art, design and diplomacy; exhibition histories; or any other aspect of 20th century design history (please feel free to email me to discuss this in more detail).

My current research is broadly divided into three areas:
1) Design, diplomacy and politics: This research draws on my doctoral thesis and examines the way design and architecture participating in shaping political discourse, both locally, in post-war Yugoslavia, as well as through diplomacy and international exchange. I am particularly interested in exhibitions and displays as vehicles for communicating and debating political ideas; as well as examining the role of architecture and design in Yugoslavia's transnational exchange with countries of the Global South as part of the non-aligned movement.

2) Material histories of data, digital technologies and automation: this research strand, which is central to my teaching, focuses on examining the role of architecture and design in shaping the objects, spaces and discourses around data, digital technologies and AI. Focusing on the case of socialist Yugoslavia, in particular, it examines the interconnection between techno-utopianism as a bureaucratic discourse, and cybernetics in architecture and design practice. My work on this topic has been published in Grey Room, most recently.

3) Environmental design history: connected to histories of cybernetics and cyber-culture under socialism, this aspect of my research focuses on the role designers and architects had in shaping the discourse around the environment and environmental crisis in 1970s Yugoslavia, tracing its emergence from 1960s cybernetics and techno-utopianism. This research, which will result in an exhibition project, has been supported by the Design History Society and the Croatian Design Association.

I am currently developing a new research project on the role of architecture and design in shaping the perceptions of health and wellbeing in post-war Eastern Europe.