Lian Loke is an artist, designer, educator and researcher, with the body as the central focus of her interdisciplinary practice. She is interested in exploring how new technologies are impacting on the lived body and its possibilities for expression, transformation and transcendence.

Her work explores the creation of body-centred artistic works and human-centred design approaches to interactive technologies and spaces. She combines dance, design, human-computer interaction and the aesthetics of interaction to critique and produce concepts, systems and performances. Her enduring interest in dance and kinaesthetic imagination drives creative research into the kinetic expression of machines, with current projects exploring how human and robots can collaboratively interact through movement, gesture and touch. She has a background and PhD in design, human-computer interaction and software engineering, with extensive experience as an educator and researcher. She researches and teaches interaction design. She is an Associate Professor in the School of Architecture, Design and Planning, The University of Sydney. She was Director of the Master of Interaction Design and Electronic Arts program (2013-2020) and Head of Design (2021).

Narjis Mirza is a media installation artist who orchestrates a poetic, philosophical, and spiritual exploration of light through sensory installations. Her work encompasses large-scale light and sound installations, seamlessly integrating projection, animation, video, textile, and voice. Through immersive experiences, she invites viewers to actively participate, transforming her artworks into interactive events.

Initially trained as a painter, Narjis graduated with the highest honour of distinction from the National College of Arts in Pakistan before pursuing a Master’s in Media and Design at Bilkent University, Ankara. Her journey led her to exhibit her work in Iran, Turkey, and Pakistan. In 2017, she was honoured with the Vice Chancellor’s Doctoral Scholarship, culminating in a practice-led PhD at Auckland University of Technology, New Zealand. Narjis contributed to the development of interactive participatory media art at the Interactive Media Lab, University of New South Wales. Her research has produced a body of work, notably the multisensory installation Hayakal al Noor, Bodies of Light, inspired by Islamic philosophy, and her latest work, Rahma: Our Creative Feminine.

Dagmar Reinhardt is a practising architect, researcher and educator, and is the principal of reinhardtjung, an architecture office based in Frankfurt and Sydney.

Reinhardt leads the robotics research group and the Master of Digital Architecture Research stream and at the School of Architecture, Design and Planning, The University of Sydney, and her design research studios are regularly awarded the prestigious National Student Award for Structural Innovation and for Digital Innovation by the AIA Institute of Architects, Sydney, NSW. Lecturing internationally, she was the Foundational Program Director of the Bachelor of Architecture and Environments (BAE, 2014-2018). As a practising architect, her built works, competitions and installations are research-based, widely published and have received numerous recognitions and awards for affordable and multi-generational residential works.

Mari Velonaki is a Professor of Social Robotics at Art & Design, UNSW. She is the founder and director of the Creative Robotics Lab (Art & Design UNSW) and the founder and director of the National Facility for Human Robot Interaction Research (UNSW, USYD, UTS, St Vincent’s Hospital).

Velonaki's approach to Social Robotics' research has been informed by aesthetics and design principles that stem from the theory and practice of Interactive Media Art. She has made significant contributions in the areas of Social Robotics, Media Art and Human-Machine Interface Design. Velonaki began working as a media artist/researcher in the field of responsive environments and interactive interface design in 1997. She pioneered experimental interfaces that incorporate movement, speech, touch, breath, electrostatic charge, artificial vision and robotics, allowing for the development of haptic and immersive relationships between participants and interactive agents.

She is the recipient of several competitive grants, including ARC Discovery, Linkage, LIEF an ARC Fellowship, an Australia Council of the Arts, Visual Arts Fellowship, Australia-Japan Foundation, Fuji Xerox Innovation, AOARD.