https://tobiasrevell.com Tobias Revell Tue, 08 Sep 2026 06:19:39 +0000 https://tobiasrevell.com en https://tobiasrevell.com/Home Thu, 26 Dec 2024 12:18:09 +0000 Tobias Revell https://tobiasrevell.com/Home display: none; font-size: 0px; line-height: 0; https://tobiasrevell.com/About Thu, 13 Jun 2013 14:08:25 +0000 Tobias Revell https://tobiasrevell.com/About <img width="553" height="833" width_o="553" height_o="833" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/60bfbf17167d271bb6ffd9f3cde03fc5b4a13a0bd5a0a6f0c4f9386dbec1d232/15-evento-londra-disegno-tagli.jpg" data-mid="224786372" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/553/i/60bfbf17167d271bb6ffd9f3cde03fc5b4a13a0bd5a0a6f0c4f9386dbec1d232/15-evento-londra-disegno-tagli.jpg" /> Tobias Revell is an artist, designer, researcher and educator from London specialising in futures and technology through critical practice. He is an Associate Director at Arup, leading a team of data and design experts to deliver projects across foresight, research, innovation, knowledge, skills and learning. Outside of Arup, he exhibits, writes and lectures internationally on futures, art, design, technology and imagination. PhDTobias is completing a PhD in Design at Goldsmiths on 'Design and The Construction of AI' which explores the different ways that design is implicated in reciprocating mainstream myths, tropes and imaginaries of AI and how critical practitioners use different creative strategies to trouble, disrupt and introduce alternatives to the mainstream. The PhD explores three main 'arenas' where AI is socially constructed; in the invention of users and use cases, the uncanny and the sublime qualities of AI and the delivery of performances and spectacles. Other positionsTobias is also an industry champion at the Creative Industries Policy and Evidence Center, a visiting lecturer at University Arts London and London Interdisciplinary School, external examiner at Sheffield Hallam and Wolverhampton University and just over one half of research and curatorial power-brand Haunted Machines. He is a Senior Fellow of the Higher Education and Academy with a focus on online education and the nature of the studio in design pedagogy. PreviouslyUntil 2021, he was Programme Director at London College of Communication, UAL where he managed, resources and led the teaching, research and knowledge exchange agendas of one of the university's largest deparments. In 2014 he co-founded design research consultancy Strange Telemetry which pioneered the use of speculative design in policy research for UK national and local government organisations. He was a founding member of Supra Systems Studio. Education He holds a BA Hons. (1st) in Design for Interaction and Moving Image from the London College of Communication and an MA in Design Interactions at the Royal College of Art from which he graduated in July 2012. https://tobiasrevell.com/Design-Futures-in-Infrastructure-OECD-2026-03 Tue, 08 Sep 2026 06:10:50 +0000 Tobias Revell https://tobiasrevell.com/Design-Futures-in-Infrastructure-OECD-2026-03 Design Futures in Infrastructure – OECD –&nbsp;2026-03 A talk about the work of Aup Foresight for the OECD’s strategic foresight community. The talk intoduced the work and methods used by Foresight at Arup and some of our recent projects with a specific focus on how design contributes the research and development process. https://tobiasrevell.com/Field-Guide-for-Design-Futures-2026-01 Tue, 08 Sep 2026 06:00:19 +0000 Tobias Revell https://tobiasrevell.com/Field-Guide-for-Design-Futures-2026-01 <img width="400" height="640" width_o="400" height_o="640" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/67df0a519ceb5ee9b6c7538ec3ba2a1b6e8a3113cbc31f598ea6c64505538339/COVER-JPG-640.png" data-mid="251937588" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/400/i/67df0a519ceb5ee9b6c7538ec3ba2a1b6e8a3113cbc31f598ea6c64505538339/COVER-JPG-640.png" /> Field Guide for Design Futures – 2026-01I contributed thoughts and responses to how to use Design Futures techniques practically in reserach and commercial settings. The book is available for free here.&nbsp;“Most people don’t spend their time sitting around wondering what the future holds; they have other things to worry about. Instead of trying to get other people to care about futures, you need to care about them. How does better understanding of considering futures help them with their own problems? How can you make futures meaningful? For instance, maybe a client is struggling with getting teams to collaborate; you might use a shared future vision to set a common mission or objective. Maybe another client is worried about their skills; what’s coming over the horizon that they might invest in now for future advantage?” https://tobiasrevell.com/The-Good-Futurist-Compass-2025-11 Tue, 08 Sep 2026 06:19:39 +0000 Tobias Revell https://tobiasrevell.com/The-Good-Futurist-Compass-2025-11 <img width="1208" height="1277" width_o="1208" height_o="1277" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/0c5a978a1dfeae870819bde95eff4e7f8536ac5efb01a357f35662a961aaa680/Screenshot-2026-09-08-at-07.21.15.png" data-mid="251937622" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/0c5a978a1dfeae870819bde95eff4e7f8536ac5efb01a357f35662a961aaa680/Screenshot-2026-09-08-at-07.21.15.png" /> The 'Good' Futurist – Compass – 2025-11An article witten in collaboration with Charlie Warwick and Bree Trevena for Compass magazine reflecting on the notiong of being a ‘good’ futurist or futures practitioner.&nbsp;“Rather than aspiring to be “good”, might we aspire to be useful? And what could “usefulness” look like? Matthew Fuller describes “seamfulness”: acts of analysis focused not on the smooth conjunction of practices, concepts and materials but on the perceptible seams and spaces, or tensions, between. He argues identification of seams – where one typology, dynamic or paradigm butts up against another – can generatively decentre power by intentionally luminating fissures, flaws, omission and leaks between boundaries. More recently, artist and futures practitioner Jevon Chandra evoked Indonesian dance scholar and curator Helly Minarti in wondering if a valuable futurist is perhaps akin to a good dramaturg – an “invested traveller” and “critical friend” able to take on the dual role of pendamping (companion) and penganggu (provocateur). Might the useful futurist be one able to constructively pull at seams, walking side by side with communities, surfacing and unpacking contradictions, overlaps, interactions and complexities? As humans are confronted by fractious, homogenous futures, all the while struggling to navigate their increasingly complex presents, futurists that play with frictions between sociological and ecological systems can surface generative combinations and possibilities, rather than reductive predictions. Playing in the messy, liminal space between agendas, norms and systems is how futures can remain open for those who don’t choose foreclosure.” https://tobiasrevell.com/Positioning-AI-Politecnico-di-Torino-2025-05 Mon, 16 Jun 2025 06:24:46 +0000 Tobias Revell https://tobiasrevell.com/Positioning-AI-Politecnico-di-Torino-2025-05 Positioning AI – Politecnico di Torino – 2025-05 A presentation and conversation with my friend Maria Luce Lupetti unpacking the relationship between my own PhD work and research on AI and the work I’m doing at Arup on the imapcts of AI across the built environment industry. How futures and critical design practice can be brought to the question of working with AI in a larger corporate context.&nbsp; https://tobiasrevell.com/Tobias-Revell-in-conversation-with-Niklas-Egberts-Design-and-the Mon, 16 Jun 2025 06:13:14 +0000 Tobias Revell https://tobiasrevell.com/Tobias-Revell-in-conversation-with-Niklas-Egberts-Design-and-the &nbsp; Tobias Revell in conversation with Niklas Egberts: Design and the Social Construction of AI – TU Dresden – 2025-05 In his presentation at Schaufler Lab, London-based designer, artist and researcher Tobias Revell shared insights from his PhD research on the role of design in the construction of AI. Among the strategies that Revell discussed are the construction of technological futures, the invention of use, the spectacle of progress, and technological normativity. Underlying these explorations is a constructivist approach that does not disregard the materiality of technology per se, but approaches AI through the sociocultural practices, scenes and events in which it is constituted as a discursive object. In the discussion, we touched on the conceptual history of enchantment and disenchantment in relation to technology and its implications for contemporary discussions about data-worlds. https://tobiasrevell.com/10-QUESTIONS-with-Tobias-Revell-The-Re-Pete-Project-2025-03 Mon, 16 Jun 2025 06:33:25 +0000 Tobias Revell https://tobiasrevell.com/10-QUESTIONS-with-Tobias-Revell-The-Re-Pete-Project-2025-03 <img width="1733" height="1082" width_o="1733" height_o="1082" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/a69d3ab2083b09ba60bbd4edc1b726f2f867800f44902bb40e3b5c24a15a72b3/Screenshot-2025-06-16-at-07.33.54.png" data-mid="234620676" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/1000/i/a69d3ab2083b09ba60bbd4edc1b726f2f867800f44902bb40e3b5c24a15a72b3/Screenshot-2025-06-16-at-07.33.54.png" /> 10 QUESTIONS with Tobias Revell&nbsp;– The Re-Pete Project – 2025-03 A short interview (given by WhatsApp voice note) with the Re-Pete project.&nbsp;I spoke about sustainability in my work and personal life. I discussed my role at Arup leading Design Futures, the company's focus on circular economy principles, and projects like "The Future of Making." &nbsp; https://tobiasrevell.com/Design-and-The-Construction-of-Imaginaries-Simon-Fraser-University Tue, 11 Mar 2025 05:55:11 +0000 Tobias Revell https://tobiasrevell.com/Design-and-The-Construction-of-Imaginaries-Simon-Fraser-University Design and The Construction of Imaginaries – Simon Fraser University – 2025-03 As futures are increasingly foreclosed by dominant tech narratives of power, speed, efficiency and consumption it’s increasingly important to question the role of design in constructing and telling these stories. This talk addresses some of the strategies and techniques used in constructing future imaginaries through design and explores ways in which the critical practice of design can be used to challenge, problematise and reveal these dominant narratives as well as propose alternatives. https://tobiasrevell.com/Near-Future-Laboratory-no-096-2025-04-28 Mon, 16 Jun 2025 10:19:06 +0000 Tobias Revell https://tobiasrevell.com/Near-Future-Laboratory-no-096-2025-04-28 <img width="900" height="900" width_o="900" height_o="900" data-src="https://freight.cargo.site/t/original/i/85106d53915ec2cf5bceaa5ea1c5716e025a865dc07692110b05b7a5d35c2189/nfl_podcast_s01e096_96.jpeg" data-mid="234635177" border="0" src="https://freight.cargo.site/w/900/i/85106d53915ec2cf5bceaa5ea1c5716e025a865dc07692110b05b7a5d35c2189/nfl_podcast_s01e096_96.jpeg" /> Near Future Laboratory no. 096 – 2024-04-28 Guest on episode 096 of the Near Future Laboratory podcast, recorded with Julian Bleecker.We discuss the chapter Julian and I published as part of Practices of Futurecasting and the role of publicaitons and event sin building cultures and communities around futures, design and everything good.&nbsp; &nbsp;