João Prates Ruivo
Associate Lecturer (2024-25)
j.pratesruivo@gold.ac.uk
João Prates Ruivo is an architect whose research focuses on the technical transformations of soils after the Second World War, specifically the relation between colonisation and irrigation. A PhD graduate from CRA with his dissertation 'Soil Politics', he investigates the role of scientific soil surveys in the anti-colonial struggles in Angola, and the relation between counterinsurgency tactics and present-day environmental disputes in Alentejo, in the South of Portugal.
João studied architecture in Lisbon at Instituto Superior Técnico, where he was a student of Professor Manuel Vicente, and worked in Rotterdam with Theo Deutinger, and at the Office for Metropolitan Architecture (O.M.A.), from where he left to Athens to found his own practice FORA. In the UK, João has taught at the School of Architecture University of Liverpool, and Syracuse University London. Currently, together with George Ridgway, he leads the Alentejo Research Unit, a research studio in Environmental Architecture at the Royal College of Art.
https://soil-politics.org/
João studied architecture in Lisbon at Instituto Superior Técnico, where he was a student of Professor Manuel Vicente, and worked in Rotterdam with Theo Deutinger, and at the Office for Metropolitan Architecture (O.M.A.), from where he left to Athens to found his own practice FORA. In the UK, João has taught at the School of Architecture University of Liverpool, and Syracuse University London. Currently, together with George Ridgway, he leads the Alentejo Research Unit, a research studio in Environmental Architecture at the Royal College of Art.
https://soil-politics.org/