The Rodina is a post-critical design studio with an experimental practice drenched in strategies of performance art, play, and subversion. Both in commissioned work and in autonomous practice, we activate and re-imagine a dazzling range of layered meanings across, below, and beyond the surface of design.
“The Rodina treat design as an agent for activity, for evoking restless responses and continual conversation.” – Eye on Design, AIGA
The studio explores spatial and interactive possibilities of virtual environments as a space for new thoughts and aesthetics that come forward from between culture and technology.
"We invent ways in which experience, knowledge and relations are produced and preserved."
The Rodina works mostly with cultural clients and specialises in visual identities, unique exhibition design, unforgettable user experience, and participatory installations. Our approach is dialogical, each design is developed processually in a close conversation with the client.
The Rodina has been researching performativity within graphic design since 2014. We coined the term "performative design"––in the field of visual communication––which is further described in Action to Surface publication.
"In their brilliant publication Action to Surface, the duo sets a new order for the political urgency of surface-led visual culture..." – There and back again: an art history of memes in the post-truth era; Alice Bucknell for Artsy
Clients
CARA, USA
Harvard GSD, USA
Columbia Uni GSAPP, USA
FRONT International, USA
Van Abbemuseum, NL
EPFL Pavilions, CH
JOAN Los Angeles, USA
ZKM Karlsruhe, DE
FACT Liverpool, UK
Rewire Festival, NL
Sonic Acts, NL
Stroom Den Haag, NL
Design Pedagogy
Tereza Ruller is a Professor of Communication Design & Digital Practices at the University of Arts and Design Karlsruhe.
Together with Vit Ruller, they teach Critical Narratives and 3D Environments at MA Information Design at Design Academy Eindhoven.
Tereza Ruller is Design Research tutor at ArtEZ Arnhem.
The Rodina exhibits, leads design workshops, and gives lectures internationally.
Internships
We are not looking for any interns at the moment.
Alexandra Superson, LU, 2022
Handi Kim, KR, 2020
Milana Kasianova, RU, 2019
Nicolai Schmelling, DK, 2019
Marianne Noordzij, NL, 2017
Jonathan Castro, PE, 2016
Anežka Minaříková, CZ, 2016
Adam Švejda, CZ, 2015
Cyanne van den Houten, NL, 2014
Constant Fernandez, FR, 2014
Jules Vaulont, FR, 2013