Now the Founding Principal of Sentient Art Works, Josh’s vocation is to understand how people and their environments maintain vitality and thrive on this planet. Throughout his life, the synthesis of both art and science have grounded this understanding. As an undergraduate, he studied environmental science and physical chemistry at UCSB. To better understand the nexus between complex social and physical systems, he went on to study architecture. He earned a master’s degree from the University of Colorado, Denver, and studied municipal and urban space design in Finland and Italy. Upon return, he served as head designer for the flagship District no.1 police station in Denver that earned AIA and industry design awards. This design success reawakened his passion for how an art/science practice can elucidate a more sustainable relationship between humans, technology, their built environment and the wider biosphere.

Most recently this led him to the Exploratorium where he co-founded the Studio for Public Spaces five years ago with Shawn Lani and others. They built a collaborative process and body of work that deeply explored these questions of vitality at the individual, community and institutional scales. Sentient Art Works is the next evolution of that exploration.