April 22, 2026
Mark Jarzombek, Professor of the History and Theory of Architecture, MIT
6:00 pm to 7:30 pm • Hayes Hall - 403
Photo: Mark Jarzombek
Mark Jarzombek is professor of the history and theory of architecture at MIT. He received his architectural diploma in 1980 and his PhD from MIT in 1986. He taught at Cornell 1987 to 1994 and came to MIT in 1995. Jarzombek works on a wide range of historical, theoretical and philosophical topics.
The Much-Maligned Contractor
There is nothing that better defines the discipline of architecture than the architecture / contractor divide. With roots in Hellenistic philosophy, it has worked its way so deeply into our cultural and theoretical world view that is now baked into the structure of the discipline. But how exactly did that come to be? The point of the talk is not to take sides, but to understand the fault line and how it determines certain outcomes in contemporary and modernist practices.
Medieval Manuscript. Photo: Mark Jarzombek
Image of Mark Jarzombek.
Jarzombek is one of the country’s leading advocates for global history and has published several books and articles on that topic, including the ground-breaking textbook entitled "A Global History of Architecture" (Wiley Press, 2006) with co-author Vikramaditya Prakash. His most recent book, "Architecture Constructed: Notes on a Discipline" (Bloomsbury, 2023), studies the frictions divided between the architect and contractor, positioning it within the problematic of Eurocentrism. Jarzombek also recently published "The Long Millennium: Affluence, Architecture and its Dark Matter Economy" (Routledge, 2023) that takes an innovative look at the first millennium CE, luxury trade and up-stream / down stream economies. Jarzombek's and Prakash's other joint venture is the Office of (Un)certainty Research [O(U)R], which is an independent "post-tenure" collaboration dedicated to challenging architecture's epistemological and design capacities and bring the conversation back into a world of immersive ambiguities. Projects from O(U)R have been exhibited at the Venice Biennale (2022, 2025) and at the Space Time, Existence Exhibition: Venice (2022) and elsewhere. O(U)R's project House Deconstructed was published by Actar Press, 2023.
The School of Architecture and Planning is an AIA CES Approved Provider. This course is AIA CES Registered and approved for 1.5 Learning Unit (LU).