About

Setareh Noorani is an architect, researcher and curator at Nieuwe Instituut, and an independent artist.

Noorani’s spatial and architectural designs emphasise her ongoing research into (institutional) spaces for collective inhabitation and appropriation, centering undernarrated voices. The designed spaces challenge contemporary value systems connected to art/architectural production, and employ a distinct visual language that is counter-‘white cube’. Clients are Metro54, Amsterdam Museum, Buro Stedelijk, Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam, Dutch Design Embassies, among others.

Setareh Noorani’s current (curatorial) research at the Nieuwe Instituut (Rotterdam, NL) focuses on the paradigm-shifting notions of decoloniality, feminisms, queer ecologies, non-institutional and collective representations in contemporary architecture, its heritage and future scenarios. She leads the projects Collecting Otherwise and Modernisms Along the Indian Ocean, co-initiated the Open Call Hidden Histories (with Creative Industries Fund NL), co-curated the exhibition Designing the Netherlands (2023), co-led the project and exhibited space Feminist Design Strategies (2021 – 2023), and has been part of Appropriation as Collective Resistance. Noorani co-edited the book ‘Women in Architecture’ (nai010, 2023), and has been published in Footprint Journal, and Radical Housing Journal, amongst others. Setareh Noorani received the Museum Talent Prize 2021, awarded by the Dutch Ministry of Culture and Science and the Mondriaan Fund. Currently, she is involved in the selection committee of the yearly Nieuwe Instituut Call for Fellows, with 2023’s co-curated theme titled Tool Shed. Recently, Noorani was part of the curatorial team of the London Design Biënnale 2023, and involved in the selection committee of the 2022 Tilting Axis Fellowship. Noorani holds a master’s degree (MSc) in Architecture (TU Delft, cum laude).

In her artistic pursuits, Noorani researches processes of public resistance and (collective) navigations of diasporic trauma. This is expressed in the disruption and dislocation of archives, and the uncovering of counter-archives, through spatial research and (self-)publishing, for example in her residencies at Voorheen De Gemeente (2022 – ), Biënnale Gelderland (2022), DSGN-IN at The Black Archives (2021-2022), SHELTER IN PLACE/SHELTER IN SOLIDARITY (2021) at Hotel Maria Kapel, Hoorn (together with graphic designer Matt Plezier, as SMET, supported by the Creative Industries Fund Netherlands).

(NL)

Setareh Noorani is architect, onderzoeker en curator bij Nieuwe Instituut, en onafhankelijk kunstenaar.

Noorani’s ruimtelijke en architectonische ontwerpen benadrukken haar voortdurende onderzoek naar (institutionele) ruimten voor collectieve toe-eigening, waarbij onderbelichte stemmen centraal staan. De ontworpen ruimtes dagen hedendaagse waardesystemen uit die verbonden zijn met kunst/architectonische productie, en gebruiken een specifieke visuele taal die tegen de ‘white cube’ ingaat. Opdrachtgevers zijn onder andere Metro54, Amsterdam Museum, Buro Stedelijk, Stedelijk Museum Amsterdam en Dutch Design Embassies.

Setareh Noorani’s huidige (curatoriële) onderzoek bij het Nieuwe Instituut (Rotterdam, NL) richt zich op de paradigma-verschuivende noties van dekolonialiteit, feminisme, queer ecologieën, niet-institutionele en collectieve representaties in de hedendaagse architectuur, haar erfgoed en toekomstscenario’s. Ze leidt de projecten Collecting Otherwise en Modernisms Along the Indian Ocean, was mede-initiatiefnemer van de Open Call Hidden Histories (met Creative Industries Fund NL), co-curator van de tentoonstelling Designing the Netherlands (2023), co-initiatiefnemer van het project en de tentoonstelling Feminist Design Strategies (2021 – 2023), en maakte deel uit van Appropriation as Collective Resistance. Noorani is co-redacteur van het boek ‘Women in Architecture’ (nai010, 2023) en heeft onder andere gepubliceerd in Footprint Journal en Radical Housing Journal. Setareh Noorani ontving de Museumtalentprijs 2021, toegekend door het Ministerie van Cultuur en Wetenschap en het Mondriaan Fonds. Momenteel is ze betrokken bij de selectiecommissie van de jaarlijkse Nieuwe Instituut Call for Fellows, met als ‘Tool Shed’ als mede gecureerd thema voor 2023. Onlangs maakte Noorani deel uit van het curatorenteam van de London Design Biënnale 2023 en was ze betrokken bij het selectiecomité van de Tilting Axis Fellowship 2022. Noorani heeft een master (MSc) in architectuur (TU Delft, cum laude).

In haar artistieke bezigheden onderzoekt Noorani processen van publiek verzet en (collectieve) navigaties van diasporisch trauma. Dit uit zich in de ontwrichting van archieven, en het blootleggen van tegenarchieven, door middel van ruimtelijk onderzoek en (zelf)publicatie, bijvoorbeeld in haar residenties bij Voorheen De Gemeente (2022 – ), Biënnale Gelderland (2022), DSGN-IN bij The Black Archives (2021-2022), SHELTER IN PLACE/SHELTER IN SOLIDARITY (2021) in Hotel Maria Kapel, Hoorn (samen met grafisch ontwerper Matt Plezier, als SMET, ondersteund door Stimuleringsfonds Creatieve Industrie).

Selected publications
Rehearsing institutional de-scripting: A machine for manifestations‘, Buro Stedelijk, 2024
Nixdorff, T., Noorani, S., (eds.) Amplifying: Archival Textures, 2024
Novás Ferradas, M., Noorani, S., Tummers, L., ‘Transferring Otherwise’, in conference proceedings International Conference Architecture and Gender, 2023.
Edens, C., Noorani, S., Schrijver, L., van ‘t Klooster, I. (eds.) ‘Vrouwen in Architectuur / Women in Architecture’: nai010 publishers, 2023
‘Housing Futures: An experimental get-together for a rekindled housing movement’, in Conversations, Radical Housing Journal 4.2, 2022
‘Designing for the ‘end’: embedding and enacting continuous actions’, in More Perspectives on Designing Cities for All: Pakhuis de Zwijger, 2022
‘Modes of Non-Linear Study’: Hoekhuis, 2022
‘Queer Life(lines) Within the Death of an Archive’,: Footprint 30 – Delft Architecture Theory Journal, 2022

Selected interviews
‘Representing Reparations’ in Between Us (Season 2 of Architectures of Planetary Well-Being), KoozArch x re:arc institute
‘Máshogy gyűjteni az építészetet’ (Collecting architecture otherwise), épitészfórum
‘Onderzoeker met een missie’, FARO – tijdschrift over cultureel erfgoed
‘Bouwen aan Architectuur’, filosofisch podcast Kluwen
Waar Staat de Ontwerppraktijk’, ArchiNed
‘Architectuur als roeping kan een gevaarlijke gedachte zijn’, De Architect

Selected (curatorial, educational, and organisational) engagements
Arus Balik / Shifting Currents, co-curator and initiator of collective programme, 2024 – 2025
Workshop host Sara Ahmed, on Institutional Change, at Leeszaal West, 2024 / Sara Ahmed was hosted with the support of the Nieuwe Instituut International Visitors Grant and EsPhil (Erasmus University, Rotterdam) / adjacent evening programme, here
Gathering facilitator of Forensic Architecture ‘Evidencing the Police Killing of Sammy Baker’, 2024 / adjacent evening programme, here
Designing the Netherlands / Nederland op de Tekentafel, curator exhibition, 2023 – 2024 / programme (see: News)
Posthuman Symbioses Masterclass: A Thinking-With Donna Haraway and Rosi Braidotti, representative on behalf of Nieuwe Instituut’s Research team, 2023
Co-facilitator of COP28: Water Cycles, at Jameel Arts Centre Dubai, 2023
Modernisms Along the Indian Ocean, research project Nieuwe Instituut, with invited guests kick-off Renan Lar-an, Hajra Haider Karrar, Ain Contractor, Amal Alhaag, 2023 – ongoing
Hidden Histories, open call and learning trajectory, set up in collaboration with Creative Industries Fund NL
Remapping Collaborations Working Group / London Design Biennale, sessions and publication (forthcoming), 2023
The Counter-Archive workshop, with gta archives (Archiving Absence), Parity Group (Fluid Archive) and SekundoS (Sonic Archive), hosted during Parity Talks, 2023
Colloquium ‘Noetics Without A Mind’, Delft University of Technology (Architecture Philosophy and Theory (APT) academic group and the Ecologies of Architecture (EoA) research group of the TU Delft Faculty of Architecture in collaboration with Het Nieuwe Instituut (HNI), 2022
Tutor ‘Archives and Information Studies’ cohort dr. Michael J. Karabinos, University of Amsterdam (UvA), 2022
Research tutor ‘Positions: Delft Lectures on Architectural Design and Research Methods‘, Delft University of Technology (chair of Methods of Analysis and Imagination), 2021
Research tutor ‘DATAPOLIS’, Delft University of Technology (chair of Complex Projects), 2021

Selected presentations
‘A Gardening Tool Shed for speculative, radical histories’, at “All Right Angles”, a residential workshop organised by Geoffrey Bawa Trust together with Colomboscope and Kälam, and with the support of EUNIC Sri Lanka, 2023
‘Collecting Otherwise as enacted project: A Trans-National situated and re-situated action’, with Robin Hartanto Honggare, at International Conference of Architectural Museums, 2022
‘Collecting Otherwise: co-developing a living, feminist archive’, at International Conference of Architectural Museums, 2022
Practicing Freedom series: Regarding Decoloniality and the Afterlife of Cultural Heritage Objects, at Goethe Institut Niederlande and Research Centre for Material Culture, 2022
Open For Discussion: Queering Architecture, with Adam Nathaniel Furman, Curatorial Research Collective, 2021
Common Field lecture series, with Marina Otero Verzier, at Barnard College – Columbia University, 2020