Faculty

Profile

Christopher Kennedy is the assistant director at the Urban Systems Lab (The New School) and lecturer in the Parsons School of Design. Kennedy’s research focuses on understanding the socio-ecological benefits of spontaneous urban plant communities in NYC, and the role of civic engagement in developing new approaches to environmental stewardship and nature-based resilience.

Kennedy's artistic practice examines conventional notions of ‘Nature’ and the biocultural possibility of interspecies agency and collaboration. With a background in environmental engineering, Kennedy playfully re-imagines field science techniques, in addition to new forms of storytelling to develop embodied research, installations, sculptures, prints and publications that aim to visualize and recontextualize complex social and ecological systems. Kennedy has worked collaboratively on projects shown at the Philadelphia Academy of Fine Arts, the North Carolina Museum of Art, the Southeastern Center for Contemporary Art, the Levine Museum of the New South, Hudson Valley Center for Contemporary Art, the Ackland Art Museum and the Queens Museum. Kennedy holds a B.S. in Environmental Engineering from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute, a M.A. in Environmental Conservation Education from NYU, and a PhD in Education and Cultural Studies from the University of North Carolina.

Degrees Held

B.S. in Environmental Engineering from Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute

M.A. in Environmental Conservation Education from NYU

PhD in Education and Cultural Studies from the University of North Carolina

Professional Affiliation

Research Interests

Urban Ecology, Spontaneous Urban Plants, Bioremediation, Ecological Justice and Art, Community Science, Climate Change