Khaled Malas is an architect and art historian.  He is the principal of Sigil, an art/design collective based in New York City, Beirut, and soon in Damascus, that explores the metamorphoses of Arab landscapes marked by historical and contemporary struggles. Sigil’s work has been widely exhibited, most recently at Chicago Architecture Biennial (2023) and the British Museum (2022-2024).  

Khaled’s academic and design research focuses on images and image-making technologies that produce and challenge the potential of places, real and imagined. He is currently completing a PhD in Islamic Art and Architectural History at NYU’s Institute of Fine Arts. His dissertation explores medieval magico-medicinal bowls that bear a depiction of the Kaaba, the cubical structure in Mecca.

In addition to his research and teaching at The Cooper Union, Khaled teaches at NYU’s Gallatin School and at Pratt Institute’s History of Art and Design Department. His creative practice was the subject of a recent interview, “What We Opt to Do” (Art Papers, Spring 2022: 30–33).  His latest work, The Longest Words: Three Talismans for Conditioning the Air (Yumum, 2024–) is a site-specific installation built into the walls of an early twentieth century house in Beirut.

Khaled holds a post-Professional Master’s Degree in Architecture from Cornell University and a Bachelor of Engineering in Architecture from the American University of Beirut.

He remains committed to hope.

Owen Nichols is an architect based in New York City where he, along with Clara Syme, co-directs a83 and the design firm Chibbernoonie. Since operating a83 he has curated over ten exhibitions, organized events and educational workshops, and has led the production of fine-art print editions for architects including Reiser + Umemoto, Young & Ayata, Common Accounts, Galo Canizares, Architensions, and Sean Canty, whose work printed by a83 was acquired by MoMA as part of their permanent collection. a83 has been featured in The Architect’s Newspaper, ARCHITECT magazine, Architectural Record, Cultured Magazine, and The New York Times. Nichols is the editor of the forthcoming book Architectural Image-Making in 1980s New York: The John Nichols Printmakers and Publishers Collection published by Spector Books. Through a83 Nichols has been the recipient of two grants from the Graham Foundation for Advanced Studies in the Fine Arts.
 
Chibbernoonie prioritizes communication through images specializing in hybrid drawings, printmaking, and modeling. Chibbernoonie has developed a portfolio of built work—including an apiary; a cafe, way-finding system, and garden for a special needs high school; and a single-family home renovation/addition—while maintaining a speculative image-based practice. Chibbernoonie’s work has been published in Pidgin, ARQ, Harvard Design Magazine, Inscriptions, edited by K. Michael Hays and Andrew Holder (Harvard University Press, 2022), and Dwell. Chibbernoonie is currently designing a music venue and nightclub in both Los Angeles and Washington D.C., a storefront in lower Manhattan, and a single-family house in New Jersey.
 
Nichols received a BFA with concentrations in drawing and printmaking and an MArch from Columbia University. He has taught at Columbia University, UFPR in Brazil, Parsons School of Design, and Cornell University.

Nichols's CV is available here.
 

Nadir Souirgi (b.1975 NYC) received his MFA in Painting and Printmaking from the Yale School of Art in 2024. He shows with David Castillo Gallery in Miami. Nadir has been an educator for more than 20 years and also worked as a bird guide leading tours in New York City and Alaska.

Yoona Hur is a Seoul-born, New York-based artist, architect, and educator. Her practice explores cultural identity, spirituality, and materiality through ceramics and painting. Drawing from Korean traditional arts, nature, meditation, and eastern philosophies of timelessness and impermanence, her work evokes the contemplative spaces between presence and change.

Her projects have been exhibited and acquired internationally, including in the United Kingdom, Italy, France, Finland, Norway, Switzerland, South Korea, Japan, Taiwan, and Hong Kong. Her works have been featured in leading publications, including Rizzoli, Wall Street Journal Magazine, The Architect’s Newspaper, Architectural Digest Italia, Elle Decoration France, The New York Times: T Magazine, Cereal, Dezeen, Maison Korea, Milk Decoration, Design Anthology, Surface, and Cultured Magazine.

As an architect, she worked at Matthew Baird Architects, Diller Scofidio + Renfro, and Agrest and Gandelsonas Architects in New York City. Her works include several institutional and cultural projects at various scales, phases and locations: Museum of Image and Sound (Brazil), Columbia University Medical Tower, South Amboy Community Center, Louis Armstrong Museum Visitor Center, Glendale Library Renovation, Spring Island Art Center and Woodmere Art Museum (U.S.A).

Hur holds a Bachelor of Fine Arts from The School of the Art Institute of Chicago (2006) and a Bachelor of Architecture from The Cooper Union, The Irwin S. Chanin School of Architecture (2010). She has been a guest lecturer and critic at The Cooper Union, SCAD and The School of Art Institute of Chicago.

Hur's CV is available here.