Lauren McQuistion

Education

Bachelor of Science in Architecture and Minor in Architectural History, UVA School of Architecture, 2011; Master of Architecture, College of Environmental Design, UC Berkeley, 2015

Biography

Lauren McQuistion is an Assistant Professor of Architecture (Virginia Architecture Fellow) and PhD Candidate in the Constructed Environment at the University of Virginia where she teaches design studios and lectures on architectural theory. These courses draw on her research interests at the intersection of art, institutions, and the disciplinary formation of architecture. Her dissertation research traces the spatialized history of the Whitney Museum of American Art, arguing that repeated reinvention through architecture has been a critical determinant of the Whitney’s institutional identity over its nearly 100-year history while also entangling the museum in the formation of a larger American cultural imaginary. Her scholarship has been recognized by the Temple Hoyne Buell Center for the Study of American Architecture, the Society of Architectural Historians, the Constructed Environment Research Network, the Buckner W. Clay Endowment for the Humanities, and the Office of Graduate and Postdoctoral Affairs at the University of Virginia.

Lauren holds degrees with distinction from the University of Virginia School of Architecture (B.S. in Architecture and a Minor in Architectural History) and the University of California Berkeley (M.Arch). Prior to returning to UVA for her PhD, she worked professionally as an architectural designer in Washington D.C. and Detroit, Michigan, experiences she draws on in her research and teaching. Her design work has been recognized by the Storefront for Art and Architecture and Terreform One, and has been featured in the Whitney Biennial. She has been an invited critic for reviews at the University of Michigan, University of California Berkeley, the City College of New York, Auburn University, Lawrence Tech University, and the University of Detroit Mercy. Her interest and expertise in the intersection of art and architecture has also provided the opportunity to contribute to several nationally reviewed exhibitions staged by the University of Virginia’s Fralin Museum of Art including Unexpected O'Keeffe: The Virginia Watercolors and Later Paintings and Skyscraper Gothic.