Three former students have been elected to join the AA Council, following a ballot of all AA members in January. We welcome Susannah Hagan, Ravin Ponniah and Yael Reisner as our new members of Council. All three have known the AA as former students, Ravin Ponniah and Yael Reisner graduating with an AA Diploma, whilst Susannah Hagan attended the postgraduate History and Theory programme. They have all maintained a close connection and interest as members of the AA since graduating. Susannah Hagan and Yael Reisner have also taught at the AA in the past, and Susannah is a former external examiner.

Council is responsible for the strategic oversight and governance of the AA. Members may be elected from the membership or appointed to bring specific skills and knowledge to the governing body.

Election for Council representatives is open to more than 3,000 members worldwide who are eligible to take part, including members of the School Community of around 1,180 current staff and students. This year Council had sought to recruit individuals with extensive experience and substantial achievements in higher education or academic research, and with international experience and expertise in making connections with communities around the world, to complement Council’s skillset and to support and promote the school’s global community and international student body.

Ravin Ponniah has worked in architecture and housing policy, and set up companies both in the UK and Malaysian. He has pursued significant research projects including an MPhil in Environmental Design and a PhD analysing urban social housing both at Cambridge University.

“I believe that I can contribute to the AA Council by being part of initiatives to make the provocative work emerging from the interdisciplinary AA Labs as well as from the school’s broader community more accessible to individuals and organisations across the world. Furthermore, my background in drawing out experimental research-led design solutions to the dominant and interlinked challenges of sustainability and affordability can complement parallel work on this already being supported by the school. There is also scope for me to contribute, as part of the council, in particular academic research areas of the AA, including urban ecologies, cultural and critical histories as well as prototyping and robotics. “

Susannah Hagan is Emeritus Professor of Architecture at the University of Westminster and, before that, she was head of architectural research at the Royal College of Art.

“I wanted to offer what help I can during a time that has brought such pressure to bear on the education sector, and on a generation who should be enjoying its time in higher education, not worrying about infection rates and the death of the city. As for academic research at the AA, whether generated in the studio or in a research cluster, it has been and is characterised by its wide variety, its inventiveness, and its potential to be transformative. At a time of disequilibrium in public health, in politics and in the biosphere, knowledge-based transformation is at a premium. More of the valuable ideas generated within architectural research need to get out into the built environment, which has such a crucial role in ensuring we thrive in step with the planet. The AA has always punched above its weight among architecture schools, and could do the same in the worlds of practice and governance through strategic research alliances that add a wider reach to its work.”

Yael Reisner is an educator, researcher and curator with experience at universities worldwide including UCL in London, SciArc, Lund Uni, ESA Paris, Confluence Institute, Lyon, GSD at Harvard University, and the University of Tokyo. She has set up independent architectural offices in Tel Aviv and London.

“The reason I’m interested in joining the AA Council, is my wish to help the effort to give the AA a more creative future. My expertise during the last ten years evolved around the subject of why beauty matters in architecture, and why architecture and beauty - since the 1940s-50s – have such a troubled relationship. I think it is the architects’ creative role to bring new beauties to cities, celebrating pluralism authentically, substituting alienation with widening the pallet of our emotional involvement, and introducing contemporary, diverse, experiences of beauty into architecture, a concept for our age, a product of individuals for other individuals. I strongly believe that in our time, beauty is not a singular idea, but its plurality prevails.”