As part of this year’s MACAA conference, Behnaz Farahi has been invited to be one of the keynote speakers for the event. Her lecture is also part of the Hixson-Lied Visiting Artist Lecture Series.

Behnaz, a designer and creative technologist based in Los Angeles is an advisory council member for the Johnny Carson Center for emerging Media Arts. Her lecture is titled “Emotive Matter from Fashion to Architecture.” How can material in the environment foster new empathetic interactions with users? What if matter could detects people’s physical movement and emotional states, and respond accordingly? Illustrated with a series of experiments, prototypes, and interventions inspired by natural systems, this presentation will address emotive material interfaces that respond to the behavior of the human body and its emotions through the implementation of emerging technologies. The lecture is FREE AND OPEN TO THE PUBLIC.