Leali’ifano Dr. Albert L Refiti

Associate Professor

School of Art and Design, Auckland University of Technology

Leali’ifano Dr Albert L Refiti was born and raised in Samoa. He has lectured in design, and the history of art and architecture and related fields at the University of Auckland School of Architecture, Unitec School of Architecture and Manukau School of Visual Arts and is currently an Associate Professor of Art and Design at Auckland University of Technology. Albert was Andrew W Mellon, Senior Scholar at the Metropolitan Museum of Arts in New York (2019/2020), where he researched the design developments for the new galleries of the department of Arts of Africa, Oceania and the Americas. He is co-principal investigators of two Marsden Grants research projects – Vā Moana: space and relationality in Pacific thought and identity (2019-2022) and Artefacts of Relations: building in the Pacific (2022-2025). Albert co-leads the Vā Moana Pacific Spaces Research Cluster at AUT University with Tina Engels-Schwarzpaul and Layne Waerea.