Robert Kett

Associate Professor
Humanities and Sciences
rkett.info

Biography

Robert J. Kett is an anthropologist and curator of design. Based in Los Angeles, he develops exhibitions, publications and programs on the cultural life of architecture and design, examining the intersections of design and technology; countercultural and everyday design; and design cultures beyond the West. He is currently an associate professor of Design Anthropology at ArtCenter and curator-at-large at the Palm Springs Art Museum, where he most recently curated So Near, So Far: Ryan Preciado—Manuel Sandoval. He received his PhD at the University of California, Irvine and has held curatorial and academic roles at the Canadian Centre for Architecture, Getty Research Institute, MAK Center for Art and Architecture, Max Planck Institute for the History of Science, and SFMOMA. His books and catalogues include So Near, So Far: Ryan Preciado—Manuel Sandoval (Karma, 2025), Prospects Beyond Futures: Counterculture White Meets Red Power (Canadian Centre for Architecture, 2020), and Learning by Doing at the Farm: Craft, Science, and Counterculture in Modern California (with Anna Kryczka, Soberscove, 2014) and his writing has appeared in 21: Inquiries into Art, History, and the Visual, Design Observer Quarterly, Getty Research Journal, Representations, and elsewhere. 

Classes

• HHIS-236-01: Transpac Histories & Futures
• HSOC-236-01: Transpac Histories & Futures
• HHIS-381-01: Cultures of Technology
• HSOC-381-01: Cultures of Technology
• HSOC-113-01: Intro to Anthropology