Dr Renée Tobe is Subject Director of Architecture at University of East London. She has previously been affiliated with a number of Universities in the UK that include Lincoln, Sheffield Hallam, Nottingham, Bath, the AA, Cambridge and UCL. Before entering academia by way of doctoral research at Cambridge University, she was in professional practice for 10 years after training at the AA, previous to which she studied Architecture at Cornell University and Ryerson University. Dr Tobe has a strong track record as primary coordinator in organising symposia, conferences and publications. These include a one day symposium and workshop entitled The Ethics of Sustainable Architecture, a 3-day International Architecture and Justice Conference. In addition, she has published widely, edited one book and is currently editing another. She has been both invited and keynote speaker at a International conferences. She is also programme leader for the MA Architecture Interpretation and Theory that investigates critical and historical practices of Architecture and how this affects our understanding of contemporary practice.

• Architecture
• MA Architecture: Interpretation and Theory

Renée Tobe's investigations into the nature of the relationship of architecture and its representation in film grants a deeper understanding of how architecture in film illuminates both architecture and the culture that produces it. Establishing a place is the fundamental task of architecture; the first task of architecture is to mark our place in the world. Architecture mediates the dialectics of dwelling and remoteness, belonging and estrangement. Realisation and expression of this exchange forms the basis for Architectural understanding. A current Research Project entitled the University and the City  investigates the synergies between the two to produce a toolkit to guide University development with limited capital investment. Dr Tobe lectures in History and Theory to Year 1 students, introducing precedents, and poetic concepts and expressions of space and place.

• BSc Architecture (Hons)
• PG Architecture
• MA Architecture: Interpretation and Theories

• AR1001
• AR1002
• ARM 101
• ARM 102
• ARM 151
• ARM 152
• ARM 153

• "Sex Happens; A phenomenological reading of the casual encounter" in Writing the Modern City, Routledge, 2011.
•  Architecture and Justice, Judicial Expressions in the Spatial Realm, editor, Ashgate Press, 2011
•  The City and the University, Research Project collaborative with Urban Design Research Group, Nottingham University

Published Books

•  The Humanities in Architectural Design, (2009) ed. N. Temple, R. Tobe, J. Lomholt, Soumyen Bandyopadhyay London: Routledge
•  Brayford Pool Development Framework (2009) R. Tobe and K. Borsi, Lincoln: Lincoln University Press

 Chapter in Book

•  “Walter Benjamin and Two Grains of Wheat”, in Walter Benjamin and Architecture (2009) ed. G. Hartoonian, London: Routledge
•  “The Inhuman One: the Mythology of the Architect as Realisateur” in Architecture and Authorship, (2006) London: Black Dog Publishing
•  “Architectural Grounding in Miller’s Elektra; Temporality and Spatiality in the Graphic Novel in Contemporary Literary Criticism 278 (2006) London: Gale
•  "Frightening and Familiar; David Lynch's Twin Peaks and the North American Suburb" in Visual Culture and Tourism (2003) Oxford: Berg
•  "The Ladies' Cabinet" in Disrupted Borders; an intervention in definitions of boundaries, ed. S. Gupta (1993) London: Rivers Oram Press

 Refereed Journal Articles

•  “Plato and Hegel at Home” in arq (11:1) 2007
•  “Time and narrative in sequential art; Frank Miller’s Elektra: Assassin” in ImageText, 2006
•  “Port Bou and Two Grains of Wheat: In Remembrance of Walter Benjamin” in Architectural Theory Review, Summer 2005
• Architecture Journals and Published Work
• “Modernist Noir” in Perspectives, Winter 2007
• “Westminster Cathedral Drawings” in Architect Journal, 12 October 1995
• “Rest Home” in Themes VI Intuition and Process, (London: Architectural Association, 1989)

Conference Papers and Presentations

 Keynote

•  “The Cultural Role Played by the Spatial Imagination” The Cultural Role of Architecture, Lincoln University, 2010

 Invited Speaker

•   “Bridging Places and Spaces In-Between” Architecture + Phenomenology 2, Kyoto, Japan, 2009
•  "Sex Happens; a Phenomenological Reading of the Casual Encounter” Architexture, Architecture and Literature, Strathclyde University, Glasgow, 2008
•  “Fear and Trembling; a Study of Why Movies Make us Afraid” Architecture + Phenomenology Conference, Haifa, Israel, May 2007
•  “Speeding into the unfixed and moveable future in neo-Tokyo” Architecture, Anime and Alternate Landscapes, Society of Architectural Historians, Savannah, USA, April 2006
•  “The Constantly Evolving Mediated Surface” Models and Drawings; AHRA Annual Conference, Nottingham University, November 2005
•  “The Inhuman One; the Mythology of Architect as Réalisateur”, Terms of Engagement: Changing definitions of the Architect, Society of Architectural Historians, Vancouver, Canada, April 2005
•  “Two Grains of Wheat; In Remembrance of Walter Benjamin” Dani Karavan Conference, University Grenoble, Port Bou, Spain, September 2004
•  “Dr Heidegger’s Cabinet of Curiosities” Primitive Conference, Cardiff University, 2004
•  “The Case of Plato’s Cave and Hegel’s Master and Slave Dialectic”  Philosophy of Architecture/Architecture of Philosophy, Congress CATH2004, 2004
•  “The Unfamiliar in the Familiar Place, The North American Suburb” Visual Culture and Tourism Conference, Anglia Ruskin University, 2000
•  “German Expressionist Film and Heidegger,” Martin Centre, Cambridge University, 2000
•  “Norman Bel Geddes and the 1939 New York World’s Fair”, Social History Conference, Caius College, Cambridge University, 2000
• “Gender and Architecture in Chantal Ackerman’s Film” Architectural Association, 1998
• “Michel Foucault and the Space of the Body”, Disrupted Borders Conference, Photographers Gallery, London, 1993
•  “Memory and the Double Image”, Ecstatic Antibodies Conference, Ikon Gallery, Birmingham, 1992

 Related Work

•  The Thing Is .... Entertainment (Channel 4), Television Set Design (1991)
•  The Big Breakfast (Channel 4), Television Set Design (1991)
•  Various (Mecompany), Product and Image Design (1991)
•  Nervous Systems (Mute Records), Illustration of ‘Odyssey Tower’ album cover (1991)

 Competitions

• AJ/Westminster Cathedral Measured Drawing Competition Commended (1995)
•  Building Design: Peoples Palace  (1994)
•  RIBA/Baltic Flour Mills Competition Commended (1994)
•  RIBA/Mausoleum Design (1993)
•  Shinkenshiku Competition Yokohama Harbour Design (1992)

 Exhibitions

•  Westminster Cathedral Centenary Exhibition, Westminster Cathedral, London (1995)
•  Metropolis, Open Window Gallery, London (1994)
•  The Ladies Cabinet, Disrupted Borders: National Gallery, Ottawa (1994)
•  Photographers Gallery, London; (1993) Arnolfini Gallery, Bristol (1994)
•  Continental Drift, Royal Institute of British Architects, London (1993)
•  Sauerbruch/Hutton Architekten Exhibition: Aedes Gallery, Berlin (1992)
•  Ecstatic Antibodies: Maison de la Culture, Montreal, (1991)
• Battersea Arts Centre, London, (1989) Impressions Gallery, York (1990)
•  Intuition and Process, Architectural Association, London (1989)

Keynote Speaker: The Cultural Role of Architecture Conference 2010

 The Cultural Role Played by the Spatial Imagination

 The discussion is premised on two fables from Western culture, both from Plato. In the first, we look at the parable of the Cave. Philosophers and filmmakers have been inspired by this parable and it is well known as a metaphor for both theatre (shadow play) and the cinema. Here we look at how filmmakers have used architecture in film to express societal dysfunction and political conformity. Careful investigation of the nature of the relationship of architecture and its representation in film grants a deeper understanding of how architecture in film illuminates both architecture and the culture that produces it. Establishing a place is the fundamental task of architecture; the first task of architecture is to mark our place in the world. Architecture mediates the dialectics of dwelling and remoteness, belonging and estrangement. The mise en scène (everything in the frame) of place and space in film, and the relation of thresholds such as doors, windows or structures of connections offers insight into the framing of human existence. Beyond the obvious function of what architecture communicates, that is of shelter and exposure, for example, we look at the metaphorical and antonymic expressions of protection and imprisonment. As the expression and development of the ideas and values of a culture and in intellectual development of the individual, architecture invites the viewers, us, who look at the film as a mirror, and bring it back to ourselves, to change what we see. The next fable is the story of Prometheus and Epimetheus, of techne and forgetting, in actuality and in metaphor and in relation to civic virtue. Understanding how architecture helps us to form our identity shows a way out of the cave.

• http://www.english.ufl.edu/imagetext/archives/v3_1/tobe/
• http://books.google.co.uk/books/about/Film_Architecture_and_Spatial_Imaginatio.html?id=Srb_tgAACAAJ&redir_esc=y
• http://journals.cambridge.org/action/displayFulltext?type=1&fid=1294000&jid=ARQ&volumeId=11&issueId=01&aid=1293996