Talk: Craft and technology

Slantis (UY), Auditorio UCU12.09 — 17:15–17:45

Artificial intelligence has already changed how we design and produce architecture. But generating code or automating tasks is the easy part. The hard part, and the part that is still ours, is knowing what to keep, what to discard and when to trust judgment over the machine.

This talk goes into the visualization process to tell where technology adds real value and where it meets its limit, and why the eye, intuition and craft count for more the more powerful the tools become.

Nicolás Franco y Franco Rissi x Slantis

Franco Rissi has been an architect since 2022, a graduate of the Facultad de Arquitectura, Diseño y Urbanismo (FADU, Udelar). His first professional steps were at Toro Arquitectos, between Montevideo and Punta del Este, starting as an intern and ending up leading commercial, hospitality and residential projects, from concept to construction. Several of them were published in ArchDaily. He came to architectural visualization from the project side. Since 2025 he has worked as a Visualization Artist at /slantis, producing high-end images for large-scale multidisciplinary projects. He is especially interested in applied research: how new technologies, from automation to AI, fit into today’s production workflows.

Nicolás Franco has been an architect since 2018 and has more than 10 years of experience alongside different architecture studios in Uruguay, among them Mirabal+Pirez Arquitectos, OAP Arquitectos and Martínez/Rudolph Arquitectos, working as a visual artist and architectural designer. He also worked as a 3D Senior Artist at MARPHvisual, collaborating remotely with international studios such as Dark Arkitekter, Yashar Architects, Spinn Arkitekter and MAD Arkitekter. In 2018 he was selected to represent FADU at the Archiprix International 2019 competition, in Santiago de Chile, finishing among the 20 finalists out of more than 300 entrants. In 2019 he received the Premio Julio Vilamajó, which recognizes creative innovation in architecture. Nicolás currently leads the Visualization Department at /slantis, a technology and architecture company with offices in Montevideo, Buenos Aires, Córdoba and San Francisco.