Richard Fadok
@slaydok.bsky.social
Anthropologist of design & multispecies ethnographer, thinking about biomimicry 🌱⚙️ and animal architecture 🦝🏛️. Assistant professor at RIT.
For more: https://www.richardfadok.com
For more: https://www.richardfadok.com
If I have to see another panel at the AAAs titled “ghosts,” “spectral,” or “haunting” (mine notwithstanding 😌).
November 18, 2025 at 12:38 PM
If I have to see another panel at the AAAs titled “ghosts,” “spectral,” or “haunting” (mine notwithstanding 😌).
My collaborator/artist-extraordinaire Mizin Shin & I have curated an exhibit at UR about bird-window collisions that explores what it means to live amidst the slow violence of architectural glass. Details below + a sneak peek @ my contribution, a “weird” field guide.
www.sageart.center/frontispace
www.sageart.center/frontispace
October 12, 2025 at 9:51 PM
My collaborator/artist-extraordinaire Mizin Shin & I have curated an exhibit at UR about bird-window collisions that explores what it means to live amidst the slow violence of architectural glass. Details below + a sneak peek @ my contribution, a “weird” field guide.
www.sageart.center/frontispace
www.sageart.center/frontispace
Yesterday, I expanded and relaunched our bird-window collision initiative as Smash the Crash ROC, beginning with a formal building monitoring study of downtown Rochester. In just 1 day, we’ve already documented 4 fatalities.
To learn how you can help, go to www.smashthecrashROC.com.
To learn how you can help, go to www.smashthecrashROC.com.
August 26, 2025 at 1:56 PM
Yesterday, I expanded and relaunched our bird-window collision initiative as Smash the Crash ROC, beginning with a formal building monitoring study of downtown Rochester. In just 1 day, we’ve already documented 4 fatalities.
To learn how you can help, go to www.smashthecrashROC.com.
To learn how you can help, go to www.smashthecrashROC.com.
I'm launching a site ft. undergrad research from my course Animal Cities. These projects tell stories of Rochester's animals, from the rare Seneca white deer, an accident of US militarism, and bird-banding to the horses that used to power the city. Please share!
www.richardfadok.com/theanimalcity/
www.richardfadok.com/theanimalcity/
June 26, 2025 at 4:33 PM
I'm launching a site ft. undergrad research from my course Animal Cities. These projects tell stories of Rochester's animals, from the rare Seneca white deer, an accident of US militarism, and bird-banding to the horses that used to power the city. Please share!
www.richardfadok.com/theanimalcity/
www.richardfadok.com/theanimalcity/
What an amazing event! Thank you, @laurajmartin.bsky.social, for organizing!
May 16, 2025 at 7:44 PM
What an amazing event! Thank you, @laurajmartin.bsky.social, for organizing!
And that’s a wrap(tor)
April 26, 2025 at 10:11 PM
And that’s a wrap(tor)
…and the rest of it.
April 26, 2025 at 12:16 PM
…and the rest of it.
Here’s some of the art…
April 26, 2025 at 12:16 PM
Here’s some of the art…
Mizin Shin and I installed our exhibition on bird-safe design this week. Over the past semester, students in her class Expanded Print Media created artworks that could deter bird-window collisions if printed onto windows. Scale models are on display in the hallway gallery of Rush Rhees Library.
April 26, 2025 at 12:16 PM
Mizin Shin and I installed our exhibition on bird-safe design this week. Over the past semester, students in her class Expanded Print Media created artworks that could deter bird-window collisions if printed onto windows. Scale models are on display in the hallway gallery of Rush Rhees Library.
When I say I have that dog in me, this is what I mean.
April 25, 2025 at 2:59 PM
When I say I have that dog in me, this is what I mean.
Holly Greenberg and Mizin Shin will be running an eco-art workshop on Monday, May 5th, from 1-4 PM at the U of R. Come make bird art and learn about window collisions and how to prevent them. It's open to everyone in the Rochester area (and beyond). After the workshop, I'll moderate a public Q&A.
April 25, 2025 at 2:43 PM
Holly Greenberg and Mizin Shin will be running an eco-art workshop on Monday, May 5th, from 1-4 PM at the U of R. Come make bird art and learn about window collisions and how to prevent them. It's open to everyone in the Rochester area (and beyond). After the workshop, I'll moderate a public Q&A.
I went to the Second Look
show yesterday at Hartnett Gallery to see Mizin Shin’s How Things Are Consumed: a 2-piece room-sized woodcut installation & photogravure collage. Corn ties nature to society, rural to urban, plant to people, and, through cut outs that resemble seeds, one artwork to another.
show yesterday at Hartnett Gallery to see Mizin Shin’s How Things Are Consumed: a 2-piece room-sized woodcut installation & photogravure collage. Corn ties nature to society, rural to urban, plant to people, and, through cut outs that resemble seeds, one artwork to another.
March 25, 2025 at 2:43 PM
I went to the Second Look
show yesterday at Hartnett Gallery to see Mizin Shin’s How Things Are Consumed: a 2-piece room-sized woodcut installation & photogravure collage. Corn ties nature to society, rural to urban, plant to people, and, through cut outs that resemble seeds, one artwork to another.
show yesterday at Hartnett Gallery to see Mizin Shin’s How Things Are Consumed: a 2-piece room-sized woodcut installation & photogravure collage. Corn ties nature to society, rural to urban, plant to people, and, through cut outs that resemble seeds, one artwork to another.
Some squirrels afoot outside my window as I Zoomed into the AAG meeting this AM. Timur Hammond and I co-organized “Ecologies of Plural Architectures,” a play on Benham’s survey of LA, w/ papers on collisions (ofc), ailanthus in Istanbul, @zuhrijames.bsky.social on Thamesmead’s rewilding, and more!
March 24, 2025 at 5:39 PM
Some squirrels afoot outside my window as I Zoomed into the AAG meeting this AM. Timur Hammond and I co-organized “Ecologies of Plural Architectures,” a play on Benham’s survey of LA, w/ papers on collisions (ofc), ailanthus in Istanbul, @zuhrijames.bsky.social on Thamesmead’s rewilding, and more!
Yesterday was the first day of the fourth and final meeting of the Multispecies Constitution Project at the Berggruen Institute. Even in better times, a constitution for the more-than-human would be more-than-aspirational, but being in this community has been emboldening, an emotional salve.
March 18, 2025 at 2:29 PM
Yesterday was the first day of the fourth and final meeting of the Multispecies Constitution Project at the Berggruen Institute. Even in better times, a constitution for the more-than-human would be more-than-aspirational, but being in this community has been emboldening, an emotional salve.
Grace Kim-Butler & Amy Johnson run a traveling Sense and Speculation workshop that explores how scientific imagination is shaped by the material culture and bodily habits of laboratory practice. Check out the prompts on their site. My favorite had participants lying under their fume hoods 🧪🔬🛏️🥱
March 13, 2025 at 3:50 PM
Grace Kim-Butler & Amy Johnson run a traveling Sense and Speculation workshop that explores how scientific imagination is shaped by the material culture and bodily habits of laboratory practice. Check out the prompts on their site. My favorite had participants lying under their fume hoods 🧪🔬🛏️🥱
When I was in Syracuse the other week, I visited George Kallander to talk about the animal studies working group we are organizing together through the Central New York Humanities Corridor. He gave me a copy of his new book on the role of animals in 14/15C Korean statecraft. I can’t wait to read it!
March 8, 2025 at 5:16 PM
When I was in Syracuse the other week, I visited George Kallander to talk about the animal studies working group we are organizing together through the Central New York Humanities Corridor. He gave me a copy of his new book on the role of animals in 14/15C Korean statecraft. I can’t wait to read it!
And here are two mockups that Mizin made to show what they’ll look like on the Sage Art Center. One group explored the notion of ecosystem scale; and the other, human impacts on the nonhuman world.
March 7, 2025 at 5:00 PM
And here are two mockups that Mizin made to show what they’ll look like on the Sage Art Center. One group explored the notion of ecosystem scale; and the other, human impacts on the nonhuman world.
In Mizin Shin’s “Expanded Print Media” course, her students are designing bird-safe window films that will be installed across the art center building. Last night they shared some of their concept drawings. Here are 3 (of 12). The negative space will be filled with a simple dot pattern.
March 6, 2025 at 5:16 PM
In Mizin Shin’s “Expanded Print Media” course, her students are designing bird-safe window films that will be installed across the art center building. Last night they shared some of their concept drawings. Here are 3 (of 12). The negative space will be filled with a simple dot pattern.
Scenes from day two:
March 3, 2025 at 8:45 PM
Scenes from day two:
I’m at Penn State today for the first half of Biophilia, a symposium on designing for (but also with and sometimes without) animals. Tomorrow I’ll be talking about—surprise!—bird-safe architecture and multispecies (in)hospitality & indifference.
March 2, 2025 at 8:10 PM
I’m at Penn State today for the first half of Biophilia, a symposium on designing for (but also with and sometimes without) animals. Tomorrow I’ll be talking about—surprise!—bird-safe architecture and multispecies (in)hospitality & indifference.
I'm giving a talk at SUNY ESF in Syracuse on Friday. I'll cover the history, science, & politics of bird-window collisions, esp. why we should think about architectural glass as a medium of "slow violence." It's from 12.30 to 1.30. Flyer's attached.
February 25, 2025 at 5:05 PM
I'm giving a talk at SUNY ESF in Syracuse on Friday. I'll cover the history, science, & politics of bird-window collisions, esp. why we should think about architectural glass as a medium of "slow violence." It's from 12.30 to 1.30. Flyer's attached.
There’s an exhibition on portraiture at the Hartnett Gallery right now, including images of animal subjects. A few caught my eye: one of a transparent dog carrier (a precursor to the clear cat backpacks seen on subways), a dead pheasant, a squirrel, and a “portrait” of a cow without a face.
February 11, 2025 at 6:28 PM
There’s an exhibition on portraiture at the Hartnett Gallery right now, including images of animal subjects. A few caught my eye: one of a transparent dog carrier (a precursor to the clear cat backpacks seen on subways), a dead pheasant, a squirrel, and a “portrait” of a cow without a face.
Learning about medieval discourses of bestiality wasn’t on my bingo card for today, but @tswingard.bsky.social just gave a fantastic talk at UR on (nonhuman) animal symbolism within 13C ecclesiastical ideas about human sexualities and their policing.
February 10, 2025 at 11:50 PM
Learning about medieval discourses of bestiality wasn’t on my bingo card for today, but @tswingard.bsky.social just gave a fantastic talk at UR on (nonhuman) animal symbolism within 13C ecclesiastical ideas about human sexualities and their policing.
Today the university administration sent out advice for instructors on the first day of classes. It’s the end of week three 🤦🏻♂️
February 7, 2025 at 9:30 PM
Today the university administration sent out advice for instructors on the first day of classes. It’s the end of week three 🤦🏻♂️