Joana Rafael is an architect practitioner and Postdoctoral Researcher, specializing in ecological concerns related to pollution and contamination, both indoors and in urban planning. Her research explores the intersections of architecture and urbanism with human geography, environmental studies, and power dynamics, encompassing contemporary culture, media studies, art, and technology. She investigates the materiality and limits of physical infrastructures in relation to Earth's systems and the reciprocal relationships between humans and nature, with a particular focus on radiologically contaminated environments. Joana has taught Contextual Studies and Contemporary Culture-related courses at institutions including ESAP in Porto, ISCE Douro in Penafiel, Central Saint Martins in London, and the University for the Creative Arts in Canterbury. She is a member of CEGOT (Center for Studies in Geography and Spatial Planning) and CEAA (Centro de Estudos Arnaldo Araújo), and a co-founder of REFINERY BOARD. Joana holds a Master of Architecture and Urban Cultures from Metropolis, Barcelona, as well as a Master of Research Architecture and a PhD in Visual Cultures from Goldsmiths, University of London. She also earned a Healthier Materials and Sustainable Building Specialization certificate from Parsons School of Design, The New School. In addition to her academic pursuits, Joana is a certified farmer.
Domestic Dusts
DIY leaflet commissioned for Valise en Carton, an itinerant exhibition of riso prints curated by Inês Moreira and Parábola Critica, Associação Cultural
on Household Dust
Household dust contains the archeological remains and trace materials of our bodily existence and of the city we live in. The clothes we wear, what we eat, of our pets and plants, remnants of the present and of the past, of lovers, the houses we inhabit as well as the erosion of our communities' mass-produced and mass-consumed material realities and the environments that hosts our houses. It hangs in the air, migrates in shape-shifting (aggregative and disintegrating) forms, gravitates towards and settles on (bordering) surfaces, amalgamates with moisture to become dirt.
In its eternal return, dust chronicles our individual activities and collective lives, turning surfaces into domestic battlefields, screens for inscription and projection of fantasies. Channeling Pollock, Dreaming of Shrimp and Cherry Blossoms document and play with these interpretations – disclosing dust as a kind of phenomenal community, a place where parts of all us, living beings and inanimate entities incessantly gather. Composing Domestic Dusts, (from Portuguese Pós Domésticos), the projects explore multi-dimensional alien realm in which we can find dreamlike formations through an animistic lens, as well as the realism of our fears in astonishing detail - related to the remains, fragments and particles – the ensemble of tiny units.