Rate My Professor Norman Teague

Norman Teague serves as Assistant Professor of Industrial Design and Foundation Studio Coordinator for 3D Form in the School of Design at the University of Illinois Chicago, within the College of Architecture, Design, and the Arts. He holds an MFA in Designed Objects from the School of the Art Institute of Chicago and a BA in Product Design from Columbia College Chicago. As a Chicago-based designer and educator, his practice focuses on using design as an agent for change and as a mechanism to empower Black and brown communities. In addition to his academic role, Teague maintains Norman Teague Design Studios and is a partner at blkHaUS studios with Fo Wilson. Their work blends contemporary aesthetics with locally sourced materials to produce furniture, objects, and spaces that represent twenty-first century design.

Teague has an extensive exhibition history and collaborative projects. In 2012, he worked with Theaster Gates on “12 Ballads for Huguenot House” at dOCUMENTA (13) in Kassel, Germany. His designs were exhibited at Rossana Orlandi Gallery in Milan in 2015, followed by his first solo exhibition at Blanc Gallery in Bronzeville. In 2017, he participated in “Wall of Respect: Vestiges, Shards and Legacy of Black Power” at the Chicago Cultural Center, chronicling a seminal mural from Chicago’s Black South Side communities. Current endeavors include “Sounding Bronzeville,” a public arts commission by the Burnham Wildlife Corridor, the Field Museum, and the Chicago Park District, teaming with Fo Wilson and designer Chris Buchakjian. Teague serves as a creative collaborator on the exhibitions team for the Barack Obama Presidential Library, led by Ralph Appelbaum Associates. Past projects feature partnerships with Leaders 1354, The Silver Room, The Exchange Café, the Chicago Architecture Foundation, and the Art Institute of Chicago. In 2023, as Assistant Professor of Industrial Design, he was a featured contributor to “Everlasting Plastics” at the United States Pavilion of the 18th International Architecture Exhibition – La Biennale di Venezia, curated by SPACES.