
Dr Alexandra Daisy Ginsberg is an artist, designer, and writer. Daisy's experimental practice explores values that shape design, science, and emerging technology through the design of objects, fictions, writing, and curating. She works with leading scientists, engineers, artists, designers, social scientists, museums, and industry around the world. Daisy is lead author of Synthetic Aesthetics: Investigating Synthetic Biology’s Designs on Nature (MIT Press, 2014) and in 2017 completed Better, her PhD at London's Royal College of Art. When we're offered dreams of better futures, she asks: "What is better? Whose better? And who gets to decide?"
Daisy received the World Technology Award for Design 2011 and the London Design Medal for Emerging Talent 2012. Her work has twice been nominated for Designs of the Year (2011, 2015), with Designing for the Sixth Extinction described in 2015 as “romantic, dangerous… and everything else that inspires us to change and question the world”.
With ten years of expertise in synthetic biology and biodesign, Daisy curated Synthetic Aesthetics (Stanford University/University of Edinburgh, 2010–2013), an international research project between synthetic biology, art, and design funded by the National Science Foundation and the EPSRC, and led the curatorial team for Grow Your Own… Life After Nature, a flagship Wellcome-funded exhibition about synthetic biology at Science Gallery, Dublin (2013–2014).
Daisy publishes, lectures, teaches, and exhibits internationally. Her work has been shown at MoMA New York, London’s Design Museum, the Art Institute of Chicago, the Israel Museum, the Museum of Contemporary Art, Tokyo and the National Museum of China, and is in museum and private collections. She has asked audiences at TEDGlobal, PopTech, Design Indaba, and the New Yorker Tech Fest to consider the design of life, and how we might design better.
EDUCATION
PhD (RCA) Design Interactions
Royal College of Art, London, UK
2013–2017
MA (RCA) Design Interactions
Dissertation: “Design Evolution: Microbes and the Everyday”
Royal College of Art, London, UK
2007–2009
Visiting Student
Graduate School of Arts/Sciences & Graduate School of Design
Harvard University, Cambridge, USA
2005–2006
MA (Cantab) Architecture, First Class
First in graduating year
Nomination, RIBA President's Medals Awards
Dissertation: "Consuming Architecture: Exploring the Ethics of a Sustainable Brandscape”
University of Cambridge, UK
2001–2004
ADVISORY ROLES
Editorial Board, Journal of Design and Science, MIT
2017-
Leonardo Group, Science Gallery London
2016-
MIT Press European Academic Advisory Council
2016-
Exhibition advisor, The Future Starts Here, Victoria & Albert Museum
2016-17
Advisor, Make Your Own Masters
2018
RESIDENCIES, FELLOWSHIPS, COMMISSIONS, PROJECTS
Commission
Engineering Life
University of Edinburgh
2017
Commission
Dezeen and MINI Frontiers
2014
Curator
V&A Late: Synthetic Aesthetics
Victoria & Albert Museum, London, UK
April 2014
Artist in Residence
Warwick Centre for Integrative Synthetic Biology (WISB)
Warwick University, UK
2013–2014
Lead Curator
Grow Your Own... Life After Nature
Science Gallery, Dublin, Ireland
2013-2014
Commission
Science Gallery, Dublin, Ireland
2013
Commission
EDF Foundation, Paris, France
2013
Design Fellow
Synthetic Aesthetics
Stanford University, USA & University of Edinburgh, UK
2010–2013
EPSRC Knowledge Transfer Award
University of Southampton, UK
2011
Visiting Fellow
ESRC Genomics Forum
University of Edinburgh, UK
February 2010
Workshop Curator/Leader
Synthesis
Arts Catalyst, University College London, University of Edinburgh
Wellcome Trust Arts Award, London, UK
2010–2011
Residency
SymbioticA, School of Anatomy and Human Biology
University of Western Australia, Perth, Australia
2009
Cofounder
AlterFutures
London, UK
2009
Co-organiser
The Long Now London
London, UK
2009
General Public Agency
Project Coordinator
London, UK
2007
Cofounder/Designer
Green Design, Harvard Graduate School of Design
Harvard University, Cambridge, USA
2005–2006
Architectural Assistant
Architecture + Urbanism Unit
Greater London Authority, London, UK
2005
JURIES
Core77 Design Awards Speculative Concepts Jury Captain
London, UK
2015
Design Indaba Innovation Award Jury
Cape Town, South Africa
2015
Dutch Design Award International Jury
Eindhoven, Holland
2014