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Post-Grad Portraits: Anna Nolda Nagele

Written byPost-Grad Community
Published date 16 January 2024

A series of interviews with alumni from across UAL, Post-Grad Portraits is a chance to highlight the achievements of postgrads from the last decade. Post-Grad Portraits is part of our celebration of Post-Grad Community's 10 year anniversary.

Anna Nolda Nagele

MA Innovation Management at Central Saint Martins 2016

Hello Anna! Could you introduce yourself?

Hi! My name is Anna Nolda Nagele and I graduated from the MA Innovation Management at Central Saint Martins in 2016. I’m originally from Austria and moved to London for the masters degree. Since then I’ve been living between both London, Vienna and St.Stefan, the small village I’m from.

Tell us about what you do now.

After graduating I took on a range of freelance jobs as design researcher and also worked as a service and business designer at EY Seren. In 2018 I got a scholarship for a PhD in Media and Arts Technology at Queen Mary University of London - which I’m now almost done with. My research is about wearable sleep-trackers and the agency of technologies on their users’ bodies.

I am very drawn to feminist new materialist and critical posthumanist theory, which I came across during my PhD research, and for many years I’ve been playing around with ideas for a magazine. In 2022 I finally started The Posthumanist magazine. Right now I’m editor of the magazine, I’m about to finish my PhD and just started a position as senior lecturer in design history and theory at the University of Applied Arts in Vienna. From time to time I also teach on the BA and MA Design Management at the London College of Communication (UAL).

publication front cover — **Anna Nolda Nagele,** **image courtesy of Anna Nolda Nagele**

publication cover — **Anna Nolda Nagele,** **image courtesy of Anna Nolda Nagele**

What's your proudest moment?

To be honest, there is not much that tops the feeling of when I handed in my masters’ thesis in 2016. Weeks of hard work resulted in something that I really produced out of my own curiosity and research The launch event for the first issue of The Posthumanist at Biblioteka in Peckham, London, was also pretty epic. In less than two weeks we organised a large event - it was such a pleasure to celebrate with all the people who were involved in the magazine.

What’s your biggest strength?

I think I’m good at gathering information and telling stories about it - research. I like to get into the details of things or get lost in rabbit holes to learn everything about a topic that intrigues me. And I think I’m good at stemming many projects at the same time…

What's your biggest weakness?

… but I would also say I’m probably not the best at time management so maybe I’m not so good at that after all. Improving my estimates about how much time something takes realistically is what I really need to improve.

launch event — **Anna Nolda Nagele,** **image courtesy of Anna Nolda Nagele**

What's the most significant learning experience you've had?

I can’t be everywhere all at once. It’s important to prioritise and say no, even if it means missing out. I feel quite torn between living in London and Austria. Both places have their own benefits and for a few years now I’ve been trying to split my time between the two, but in the long run this is not very sustainable.

What's your favourite artwork?

At the moment, that’s Doube Plot (2018) by Otobong Nkanga. I saw this large tapestry for the first time in 2018 in Cardiff (Wales) in the artist’s Artes Mundi exhibition and again recently at the Hayward Gallery’s Dear Earth exhibition (2023). I love how the different textures and materials are interwoven, and the depiction of rigidity and violence of human action - drawing borders and exploiting natural resources - against the backdrop of organic shapes and the ever expanding universe.

publication pages — **Anna Nolda Nagele,** **image courtesy of Anna Nolda Nagele**

a workshop wioth participants — **Anna Nolda Nagele,** **image courtesy of Anna Nolda Nagele**

Where do you see yourself in 10 years?

I hope that I’m still working on The Posthumanist magazine - but that it has developed into a format where we can host more real-life events, workshops, even summer schools or residencies. And I do also see myself working in research and teaching. Either academically or in the industry. But who knows - the future seems very uncertain at the moment and I might be doing something more practical than that.

Where can people find out more about your work?

Have a look at annanoldanagele.com or theposthumanist.com - there you also find links to social media accounts.