Andy works as an artist + architect to better understand, disrupt and/or alter crucial environmental, economic and social issues within the domain of public culture + urbanism.
For Andy, one of the keys to developing intelligent, equitable and compelling provocations to these urgent issues is to work co-productively and critically with those most affected by them.

Mr Sturm has worked with diverse groups ranging from guards, women and children inside Nairobi’s maximum security women’s prison, to underrepresented students, parents and teachers at large, urban school districts, to neighborhood activists and mission-driven NGOs in places like Potsdam (Germany), Granada (Nicaragua) Detroit, New York and Dallas. 

Andy has taught/critiqued/organized design in various communities/exhibits/events in Central America, East Africa, the U.S. and Europe. In 2008, Andy co-curated the U.S. Pavilion at the Venice Biennale of Architecture, highlighting the work of artists, architects and creative instigators at the forefront of redefining architectural practice in the United States.

In his practice, Andy has worked across multiple genres and scales from public performances + art installations that challenged the city of Detroit’s attitude toward burned, abandoned homes - to the insertion of unauthorized public infrastructure that temporarily projected the needs of neighbors over convoluted municipal regulations in Dallas, Texas.

While at UCSD Andy is focusing on the Tijuana/San Diego border region investigating new cartographic tools, new methods of curating public dialogue and new prototypes for how public infrastructure and social agencies can fortify communities. His work builds on and collaborates with the work of Fonna Forman, Teddy Cruz, the Cross-Border Initiative, the Center on Global Justice (both at UCSD) as well as communities / activists on both sides of the border.