New professor for Architectural Design as of 17.2.: Imke Woelk

Imke Woelk holds a doctorate in architecture and is also an artist. Drawing and painting have been part of her life since childhood and form an integral part of her practice. She uses these media both as a methodological tool for spatial research and as an independent form of artistic expression.

Woelk studied architecture at Leibniz University Hannover, Università Iuav di Venezia, and TU Braunschweig (diploma in 1993). She also completed the course The Architectural Imagination with K. Michael Hays and Erika Naginski at the Harvard Graduate School of Design and studied photography as a guest student at HBK Braunschweig with Michael Ruetz. In 2010, she received her doctorate from the TU Berlin under Prof. Finn Geipel with a dissertation entitled Der offene Raum – Der Gebrauchswert der Halle der Neuen Nationalgalerie Berlin von Ludwig Mies van der Rohe.

The annual scholarship from the German Academy in Rome, Villa Massimo, in 2003 was a significant point of reference. The works created there reflect the relationship between landscape formations, spatial principles of order, and artistic imagination. Her research combines architectural thinking with a dialogical approach that aims at a deeper understanding of space, structure, and environment. Her research combines architectural thinking with a dialogical approach that aims to deepen our understanding of space, structure, and the environment. Her work is dedicated to the conceptual repositioning of the human habitat in the Anthropocene and develops well-founded approaches to ecological and social challenges. 

From 1993 to 1996, Woelk worked in the offices of Massimiliano Fuksas in Rome and William Alsop in London. Since 2006, she has been running the Berlin-based firm IMKEWOELK + Partner together with architect Martin Cors, where she is responsible for projects from conception to completion. She gained international attention in 2004 when she won first prize in the international competition “400,000 Apartments” organized by the Catalan Architects' Association (COAC). Her work has been exhibited worldwide, including a solo exhibition on the Katsura Villa at Galerie Dittmar Berlin. In addition to her practical and artistic activities, she has taught and researched at the Technical University of Berlin, the Metropolitan University of London, the Università Roma Tre, and Duksung Women's University in Seoul. Since 2016, she has been a member of the Advisory Committee for Art in Architecture and Urban Planning of the Berlin Senate Department for Culture and Europe.

Her work at the Academy of Fine Arts Vienna will explore architectures that respond to the conditions of contemporary uncertainty with spatial precision.