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Staff Profile

Dr Matthew Ozga-Lawn

Lecturer in Architecture

  • Email: matthew.ozga-lawn@ncl.ac.uk
  • Telephone: +44 (0) 191 208 6019
  • Address: School of Architecture Planning and Landscape
    The Quadrangle
    University of Newcastle
    Newcastle upon Tyne
    NE1 7RU
Background

Matthew is a Lecturer in Architecture at Newcastle University. He is co-Director of Postgraduate Taught Research programmes, co-Degree Programme Director of MSc Advanced Architectural Design, and co-director of Representation and Communication in the School. Matthew was previously Stage Coordinator of Stage 6 (MArch final year) Architectural Design, and has taught extensively in the MArch and BA programmes.

Matthew completed his Ph.D. by Creative Practice at Newcastle University in 2020, entitled The Duke In His Domain: the apparatus of the architectural drawing. The Ph.D., developed through installation, explores the perspectival underpinnings of architectural processes, translocating a small Renaissance theatre in the citta ideale of Sabbioneta, Italy into the office space Matthew occupies. The theatre, constructed around a perspectival stage, reconfigures the office and the representational fragments it contains into an inhabited, working model of the visual and embodied relationships between architectural representations.

Along with James A. Craig, Matthew runs the experimental design platform Stasus, who have been published in the influential Pamphlet Architecture series, arq (Architecture Research Quarterly), the Paper for Emerging Architectural Research (PEAR) and AD magazine.


Qualifications

MA (Hons), MArch (Dist.), Ph.D.

 

Research

Matthew's research is centered on understanding and testing the limits of architectural representation. Architectural drawing is often considered as part of a linear process of instrumental exercises towards building. Through centering drawing processes as the object of study, this linearity can be challenged and disrupted. Architectural drawings have rich histories and complex spatial characteristics that give them unique qualities as the subject of research. Matthew engages them through creative practice methods, demonstrating these qualities and their limits through installation practices and other interrogative strategies.

Installation is of particular interest as it locates drawing objects and practices, generating a dialogue between conventional architectural modes and the spaces through which they are interacted with and created. This necessarily dismantles assumptions around the neutrality of the studio space, and the reading of architectural drawings in general. Techniques such as those developed through anamorphosis help instigate this method.

Matthew undertakes this work through his own creative practice and written research, along with collaborative work with James Craig in their practice Stasus. Stasus acts as a platform for testing architectural drawing modes, along with teaching research-led studios.


PhD Supervision

Matthew is interested in supervising PhD research around architectural representation, particularly creative practice work dealing with issues of embodiment, performance and installation. Matthew has supervised the following PhD candidates to completion:

Usue Ruiz Arana, The Enchantment of the Wild (2020)

Teaching

Matthew currently co-leads the MSc in Advanced Architectural Design. This programme tackles complex urban regions and develops strategies through innovative modes of architectural representation. 

Previously Matthew has led MArch studios and coordinated final year (Stage 6) design. These studios are research-led and have an established history of installation-based work and experimentation. Matthew has taught extensively in the MArch and BA programmes, leading studios and history/theory modules.

Matthew also leads the third year module Theory into Practice,  focusing on reflective practice and theorisation of representational techniques and their implementation in design practice.

Publications