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Michael Finbarr Mullins
Michael Finbarr Mullins (30 October 1950 – ) is a South African born architect and academic who has lived permanently in Denmark since 2002. Growing up in Durban, Natal province (now KwaZulu Natal province) he studied architecture at Natal University for two years, before deciding to leave South Africa in 1972 to avoid extended military service under the apartheid regime. He hitchhiked to Europe through South Africa, South West Africa (now Namibia) and Angola. After two years of travelling, he enrolled to continue his studies at the School of Architecture at the Royal Academy of Arts in Copenhagen. He returned to South Africa in 1979 and practiced for twenty years in his native country. While working with his father, architect Gerald Finbarr Mullins (1926 - 2015), Mullins developed methods for rationalizing house plans and materials to provide economical solutions to the enormous post-apartheid housing challenge. He took up a part-time teaching post at KwaZulu Natal University in Durban in 1995, where he developed an interest in computer modelling and Virtual Reality. In 2002, he returned to Denmark to take up an appointment as Assistant Professor at Aalborg University, in the town of Aalborg in Northern Jutland. He completed a PhD in 2005 on the subject of Virtual Reality. In 2006, Mullins was appointed head of the Department of Architecture and Design at Aalborg University, Aalborg. He moved to the university's Copenhagen campus in 2013, where he established an Masters education and research program in Lighting Design, the first of its kind in Denmark. He is currently deputy head of the Department of Architecture, Design and Media Technology.