Mark Jarzombek, Professor of the History and Theory of Architecture, is the Associate Dean of MIT's School of Architecture and Planning. He has taught at MIT since 1995, and has worked on a wide range of historical topics from the Renaissance to the modern. Jarzombek, who was an undergraduate at the University of Chicago, received his architectural Diploma in 1980 from the Eidgenössische Technische Hochschule and his Ph.D. from MIT in 1986. He was a CASVA fellow (1985), Post-doctoral Resident Fellow at the J. Paul Getty Center for the History of Humanities and Art, Santa Monica, California (1986), a fellow at the Institute for Advanced Study, Princeton, NJ (1993), at the Canadian Center for Architecture (2001) and at the Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute (2005). He has worked extensively on nineteenth and twentieth century aesthetics, and the history and theory of architecture. He has just published a textbook entitled A Global History of Architecture (Wiley Press, 2006) with co-author Vikram Prakash with the noted illustrator Francis D.K. Ching. Jarzombek is currently working on a set of essays on architecture and modernity. Jarzombek teaches a range of courses at the graduate and Ph.D. level in the History Theory Criticism program (HTC) of the Department of Architecture .

Recent Interview:

April 23, 2009 in Murcia Spain produced by Observatorio del Diseño y la Arquitectura. The interview covers a range of topics from Sustainability to the future of architecture.

Latest publications:

"The Metaphysics of Permanence -- Curating Critical Impossibilities", in Log #21 (New York, NY: Anyone Corporation, 2010), pp. 125-135.

"Art History and its Architectural Aporia", in Art and Globalization, edited by James Elkins, Alice S. Kim and Shivka Valiavicharska (University Park, PA: The Pennsylvania State University Press, 2010), pp. 188-194.

"Corridor Spaces" in Critical Theory vol 36, no. 4, (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, Summer 2010), pp 728-770.

"The State of Theory" in Architecture and Theory: Production and Reflection, Luise King editor. (Hamburg, Germany: Junius Verlag, 2009): 262-273.

This paper discusses the definition of “theory” in the context of architectural discourse. -- posted Jan 10

"The Civilian and the Crisis of the Utopian Monument" in Krzysztof Wodiczko, City of Refuge: A 9/11 Memorial, Mark Jarzombek and Mechtild Widrich eds. (London, UK: Black Dog Publishing, 2009): 61-66.

The art and writings of Krzysztof Wodiczko are here discussed in terms of what Jarzombek sees is the provocative and enigmatic shift from an art of “public space” to one of “civilian space.” -- posted Jan 10