Markus Miessen


Markus Miessen is a German architect and writer.
Miessen received his bachelor's degree from the Glasgow School of Art, continuing his studies at the Architectural Association in London and at the London Consortium. His PhD was completed at the Centre for Research Architecture at Goldsmiths in 2015 under the supervision of Eyal Weizman.
From 2011 to 2016 Miessen held the position of Distinguished Professor in Practice at the University of Southern California, USC. Other teaching positions include Stiftungsprofessur and Critical Spaces Practice at the Städelschule, guest professor at HEAD, visiting professor at the Hochschule für Gestaltung at the Berlage Institute, and Unit Master at the Architectural Association. The Winter School Middle East was initiated by Miessen in 2008. He became a Harvard GSD Fellow in 2010.
Since 2016 he is a Professor at HDK - Academy of Design and Crafts, University of Gothenburg, Sweden.

Work

Studio Miessen was founded in London in 2005 and has been based in Berlin since 2008, working on architectural and spatial design projects in Europe, North America, the Middle East and Asia. The studio has worked with institutional clients and collaborators such as Art Basel, Art Sonje Center, b-05 Art & Cultural Centre, e-flux, Government of Slovenia, Haus der Kulturen der Welt, the Serpentine Gallery, Witte de With, Weltkulturen Museum, Institute of Modern Art, Kunstverein in Hamburg, Biennials such as the Gwangju Biennale, Performa, Sydney Biennial, Berlin Biennale, Venice Biennale, Istanbul Biennale and artists such as Hito Steyerl, Dénes Farkas, Liam Gillick, Flaka Haliti, Slater Bradley and Stefanos Tsivopoulos.
In 2006 Miessen and Hans Ulrich Obrist founded the Brutally Early Club., conducting conversational, salon-type meetings in post-public spaces at 6:30 AM in originally in London and later in Berlin, New York City and Paris.
Markus Miessen has authored books such as Crossbenching, and The Nightmare of Participation.
In collaboration with Nikolaus Hirsch, Markus Miessen initiated and edits the Critical Spatial Practice book series at Sternberg Press, publishing contributors including Keller Easterling, Beatriz Colomina, Chantal Mouffe, Eyal Weizman, Felicity Scott, Metahaven, Armin Linke, Trevor Paglen, Rabih Mroué and Jill Magid.
Miessen has worked as a consultant to the Government of Slovenia during their presidency of the EU Council, The European Kunsthalle, the Dutch Foundation for Art and Public Domain , the Serpentine Gallery, the European Commission and the Kosova National Art Gallery.

Selected Books