conference _ GLOBAL SUMMIT ON COLLECTIVE HOUSING

“At Home with the Collective: A Summit on Communal Housing,” convened at UIC Architecture in Chicago, Thursday, October 19 – Friday, October 20, 2023. This 2-day summit gathered speakers from around the world, local stakeholders and activists, as well as city officials who have radically rethought established norms of living, models of homeownership, and the formal, programmatic, material, and legal parameters of housing. Our ambition was to generate new knowledge that can confront the current struggle for affordability and speak to the potential of collective housing as a productive challenge for architecture.

talk _ Jefferson University

Lecture on “The Good Metropolis” at Jefferson University, College of Architecture and the Built Environment, 6pm, September 21, 2020. 

research _ Award for Creative Activity

The Office of the Vice Chancellor of Research at UIC awarded Eisenschmidt the Creative Activity Prize for the book project Felix Candela in Chicago, 2020.

review _ Good Metropolis

Review of The Good Metropolis in Architectural Record. Daniel Brook writes: “Eisenschmidt audaciously argues that a central tension in modern city-building has gone hiding in plain sight. While architects are by nature control freaks, sweating the details of their artifacts, the space where their creations are housed—the modern metropolis—is, by nature, out of control … All should eagerly tune in to his future broadcasts.”

City of Architectural Fiction

Journal of Architectural Education (JAE 72:1) published the “City of Architectural Fiction” drawing (previously on view at Lisbon Triennale, 2016) as part of the Discursive Image series.

talk _ MICHIGAN LECTURE

Lecture, “The City as Visionary Project,” to the Urban Design Program at the Taubman College, University of Michigan, February 3, 2017, 6pm.

VC News

VC Project featured in UIC News

book _ CHICAGOISMS REVIEW

Chicagoisms makes Architecture Boston (AB) List of top books to read in 1914, followed by Koolhaas’ Delirious New York and Wolfe’s From Bauhaus to Our House.

talk _ Visionary at CAF

“A New Visionary;” lecture at the “Instruments for Urban Production” symposium in conjunction with the book launch of The Petropolis of Tomorrow and hosted at the Chicago Architecture Foundation, April 25, 2014, 6pm.

research/teaching _ CONVERSATIONS ON THE CITY

CONVERSATIONS ON THE CITY: This is an ongoing series of conversations on topics related to the contemporary city. The core of these dialogues lies in the pursuit of an architectural urbanism, in identifying different forms of engagements with the city, and in formulating the project of architecture as that of the city. Recordings of conversations include: Martin Felsen, Winy Maas, Stanley Tigerman, Bernard Tschumi (published in City Catalyst with AD), Andrew Zago, and Elia Zenghelis.

Book Launch of City Catalyst at UIC

Book Launch of City Catalyst at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Chicago (September 22, 2012, 1pm) and Launch Party at the University of Illinois at Chicago’s School of Architecture (October 5, 2012, 6pm).

exhibit _ “CITY WORKS” AT THE 13th VENICE ARCHITECTURE BIENNALE

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Designer and curator of City Works exhibition at the 13th International Architecture Biennale in Venice, Italy, August 27 – November 25, 2012.

Invited by David Chipperfield, director of the 13th Venice Biennale, Eisenschmidt designed and curated an exhibition that re-envisions a series of Chicago’s urban environments. The installation is a collaborative effort of 5 teams that involves a large model of a visionary Chicago (12’x12′, produced by David Brown, Studio Gang, Stanley Tigerman, and UrbanLab) as well as an encompassing drawing (100’ long) that creates a visual backdrop. The outside of the screen (produced by the Visionary Cities Project/Alexander Eisenschmidt) is a panorama of a Phantom Chicago, entirely composed of unbuilt visionary proposals for the city.

essay _ URBAN FORM x3

Review of The Liberal Monument: Urban Design and the Late Modern Project, by Alexander D’Hooghe, Journal of Architectural Education, #65:2 (May 2012): 143-145.

interview _ NON-CONCEPT CITY

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“The Non-Concept City,” a discussion on urbanism with Edward Mitchell, including Robert Bruegmann, Ellen Grimes, Tim Mennel, Jonathan Miller, organized by New Projects, Chicago, March 13, 2012. The exchange was published in the Journal of Architectural Education #66.1, October 2012.

research/teaching _ EXTRAPOLATED CITY

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Extrapolated City exagerates isolated conditions of the existing city in order to create new forms of urbanism, where rivers runs through intersections, bridges start to cross between skyscrapers, lakes appear in the Loop, rooftops become lush gardens, buildings begin to set back, vertical parks grow tall, urban graphics are written into the shoreline, and individual monuments form historical archipelagos.

interview _ CONVERSATION ABOUT ARCHITECTURE ON DISPLAY

Published in Four Conversations on the Architecture of Discourse, eds. Aaron Levy and William Menking (London: AA Publications, 2012). Excerpts from a recorded discussion, organized and hosted by the Graham Foundation, on the state of architectural exhibitions, April 27, 2011 (other participants: Sarah Herda (host), William Menking, Aaron Levy, Penelope Dean, Theaster Gates, Mark Wasiuta, Lisa Lee, …).

talk _ URBANISM AND OTHER URBAN PRACTICES

“Urbanisms and Other Urban Practices,” lecture at Symposium on Architectural and Urban History at the University of Illinois at Chicago (organized by Robert Bruegmann), October 28, 2011.

essay _ LECTURE CITATION

“Theorien der Raumanschauung und die Entstehung einer neuen Metropole,” was cited in Matthias Schirren’s article “Freiheit und Ordnung: Der Philharmonie Osteingang,” in Scharoun, exhibition catalog, 2011.

talk _ NEW RESEARCH

Round table participant on “New Research,” Northwestern University, Chicago, December 3, 2010 (other participants: Barry Bergdoll, Andreas Beyer, Neil Levine, Martin Bressani, Robert Bruegmann, and Harry Mallgrave; organized by David Van Zanten).

talk _ STRANGER THAN FICTION

“Stranger Than Fiction,” lecture at the Once Upon a Place – International Conference on Architecture and Fiction, at the occasion of the Lisbon Triennial of Architecture, Lisbon, Portugal, October 12, 2010.

talk _ THEORIEN DER RAUMANSCHAUUNG UND DIE ENTSTEHUNG EINER NEUEN METROPOLE

“Theorien der Raumanschauung und die Entstehung einer neuen Metropole,” lecture at the August Endell: Die Berliner Jahre, Freie Universität Berlin, Kunsthistorisches Institut, April 24, 2010. (cited in Matthias Schirren’s article “Freiheit und Ordnung: Der Philharmonie Osteingang,” Catalog on Scharoun’s Philharmonie, 2011).

conference _ CHICAGO IN THE WORLD

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“Chicago in the World” session at the Annual SAH Meeting, co-chaired with Jonathan Mekinda Chicago, April 22, 2010 (speakers included Penelope Dean, John Harwood, Igor Marjanovic, and Joanna Merwood-Salisbury). 

talk _ ARCHITECTURE IN SEARCH FOR A LANGUAGE OF URBAN RESISTANCE

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“Architecture in Search for a Language of Urban Resistance,” lecture at the Spiegel Symposium, structured around an exhibition of Barry Le Va, Institute of Contemporary Art (ICA), Philadelphia, PA, March 17-18, 2005 (speakers included David Lewis and Mark Wasiuta, moderated by Detlef Mertins; with keynote lectures by Greil Marcus and Barry Le Va).

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