Matthew Mullane is an Assistant Professor of the History and Theory of Architecture at Radboud University in Nijmegen, NL. He received his PhD from Princeton University (2019) and was a postdoctoral fellow at Harvard University’s Reischauer Institute of Japanese Studies, and Tokyo College, The University of Tokyo. His forthcoming book, World Observation: Empire, Architecture, and the Global Archive of Itō Chūta (University of Pittsburgh Press, 2025), offers an alternative origin for global architecture history in nineteenth-century Japan and theorizes a new role for “observation” in architectural thought. He is interested in the ways that architects have conspired with scientists to develop new epistemologies of “global history,” a topic he has explored in articles featuring geologists and architects in England, and entomologists and engineers in colonial Japan. In addition to his historical scholarship, he has also published on the aesthetic and ethical dimensions of contemporary digital technologies impacting architecture, including social media, cryptocurrency, and blockchain. Forthcoming publications include a book chapter on the reception of global architecture history in Meiji Japan, and a monograph on the global networks of contemporary scientific observatories. His writing has appeared in Architectural Theory Review, The Journal of Architecture, Kenchiku zasshi, AA Files, Log, gta papers, CLARA, Art Papers, and others.
Short Biography
2022-Present Assistant Professor in the History and Theory of Architecture, Radboud University
2021-2022 Postdoctoral Fellow, Tokyo College, The University of Tokyo
2020-2021 Visiting Assistant Professor, University of Oregon
2019-2020 Postdoctoral Fellow, Reischauer Institute of Japanese Studies, Harvard University
2019 PhD in Architecture History and Theory, School of Architecture, Princeton University
2012 MA in Modern Art History, Theory and Criticism, School of the Art Institute of Chicago
2009 BA in Art History, Hiram College
E-mail:
matthewtmullane@gmail.com