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IIT College of Architecture
    Sean Keller, Ph.D.

    Sean Keller, Ph.D.

    Assistant Professor

    Office: 3410 S. State Street, Room 210
    Office Hours: By appointment
    Phone: 312.567.3828
    Fax: 312.567.5820
    Email: skeller1@iit.edu
    Web:

    Expertise

    • Architectural history, theory, and criticism.

    Education

    • Ph.D., Harvard University
    • M.Arch, Princeton University
    • B.A., Princeton University

    Curriculum Vitae


    Courses Taught

    ARCH 321: History of Modern Thought in Architecture
    ARCH 501: History of Architectural Ideas II: 1900 to Present
    ARCH 502: Advanced Topics in History and Theory I
    ARCH 503: Advanced Topics in History and Theory II
    ARCH 593: Masters Project
    ARCH 691: Doctoral Research

    Research & Major Accomplishments

    Sean Keller is a historian and critic of modern and contemporary architecture, with a focus on the relationship of architecture and technology after 1945. He is the recipient of the 2009 Winterhouse Award for Design Writing and Criticism, and is a trustee of the Graham Foundation. Prof. Keller is a frequent contributor to Artforum, where he has written on computational architecture, the restoration of mid-century-modern buildings, the Beijing Olympics, Buckminster Fuller, Liam Gillick, and Renzo Piano’s museums. His writings also have appeared, or will appear, in the anthologies Atomic Dwelling and Architecture and Authorship; and in the journals Grey Room, Perspecta, Constructs, and Art Journal. He has been an invited speaker throughout the United States and Europe, and has taught at Harvard and Yale universities. He is currently working on two books: one entitled Semi-Automatic: Architectural Design Methods, 1960-1975, and the other on the architecture and art of the 1972 Munich Olympics.

    Current Projects

    Awards/Honors

    • Forthcoming: Research Fellow, Internationales Kolleg fur Kulturtechnikforschung und Medienphilosophie, Bauhaus-Universitat, Weimar, 2012.
    • Warhol Foundation Arts Writers Grant, 2011.
    • Winterhouse Award for Design Writing and Criticism, Winterhouse Institute and AIGA, 2009.
    • Graham Foundation for Advanced Studies in the Fine Arts, Production and Presentation Grant for the symposium "What Next? Projecting Futures for Architecture," 2008.

    Patents

    Books

    Selected Publications

    Forthcoming: "Beauty, Genius, and Epigenesis: The Kantian Aesthetics of Computational Architecture," Journal of Architectural Education, (2012).

    Forthcoming: "The Anxieties of Autonomy: Eisenman from Cambridge to House VI" in Atomic Dwelling: Anxiety, Domesticity, and Postwar Architecture, ed. Robin Schuldenfrei (New York: Routledge, 2011).

    Forthcoming: "Process Errors," Perspecta: The Yale Architectural Journal 46: Error, ed. Joseph Clarke, Zachary Heineman, and Emma Bloomfield (Cambridge: MIT Press, 2013).

    Forthcoming: "Drafting Dodgers," Zeitschrift für Medien- und Kulturforschung 1/2012 (January 2012), theme issue on drafting.

    "Playing the Field: On Computational Architecture and Postwar Abstraction," Artforum (Summer 2011).

    “Liam Gillick,” Artforum (April 2010): 188-189.

    “Well-tempered Piano” [on the museums of Renzo Piano], Artforum (Summer 2009): 304-311.

    “Navigating Systems” [on R. Buckminster Fuller], Artforum (November 2008): 282-294.

    “Bidden City” [on the Beijing Olympics], Artforum (Summer 2008): 137-142.

    "Systems Aesthetics, or How Cambridge Solved Architecture" in Architecture and Authorship: Studies in Disciplinary Remediation, ed. Rolf Hughes, Katja Grillner, and Tim Anstey (London: Black Dog Publications, 2007): 156-163.

    "Behind the Curtain” [on renovating Crown Hall and the Yale University Art Gallery], Artforum (February 2007): 101-2.

    "Fenland Tech: Architectural Science in Postwar Cambridge," Grey Room 23 (Spring 2006): 40-65.

    Professional Society Memberships

    Editorial Board Service

    Professional Society Service

    Grants and Fellowships

    Community Service