Dionisio Cortes Ortega

Instructor Adjunct

Dionisio Cortes Ortega is an architect, artist and educator. He is an adjunct instructor for
Representation I as well as Co-founder and Principal of Reform Architecture, a full service and multidisciplinary architecture and design practice based in the Bronx. Reform Architecture is committed to conscientious design through the following process: questioning, reasoning, analyzing, dissecting, re-examining, rejecting the status quo, creatively obsessing, and visualizing the invisible. Reform Architecture's current ongoing projects include a dance school in Michoacán, Mexico; a community center in a repurposed church in Brooklyn; and several historic restoration projects in lower manhattan.

Dionisio graduated from The Irwin S. Chanin School of Architecture in 2009. He is a registered architect in the State of New York and a member of the American Institute of Architects (AIA) Bronx Chapter. Before co-founding Reform Architecture, Dionisio worked on a number of institutional and residential projects while at Selldorf Architects and more than a dozen restaurants projects while at HapstakDemetriou+ in Washington DC.

Dionisio has been invited as guest critic to a number of studio and drawing reviews at The Irwin S. Chanin School of Architecture, Graduate School of Architecture, Planning and Preservation, The Bernard and Anne Spitzer School of Architecture, and at the National University of Singapore.

Concurrent with his architectural practice, Dionisio designs outdoor interactive sculptures. His two latest installation are:

  • Sitting Together, built by Reform Architecture, was on view at the Joyce Kilmer Park in The Bronx in 2019.
  • Croton Arch of Triumph, a sculpture/monument that was on view from August 2020 to May 2021 at the Socrates Sculpture Park in Queens.

Dionisio's CV is available here. His work can also be viewed here

  • Founded by inventor, industrialist and philanthropist Peter Cooper in 1859, The Cooper Union for the Advancement of Science and Art offers education in art, architecture and engineering, as well as courses in the humanities and social sciences.

  • “My feelings, my desires, my hopes, embrace humanity throughout the world,” Peter Cooper proclaimed in a speech in 1853. He looked forward to a time when, “knowledge shall cover the earth as waters cover the great deep.”

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