University of Oregon Provost Scott Coltrane announced today that the search for a new Dean of the School of Architecture and Allied Arts, which began last fall, is over. Christoph Lindner, professor of media and culture at the University of Amsterdam, has been named the A&AA Dean. He will begin his role on Aug 15, in time for the 2016-17 academic year.
Lawrence Hall hasn’t had a permanent dean since former UO President Michael Gottfredson’s resignation in 2014. The former dean of the A&AA school, Frances Bronet, left the position to serve as interim provost in lieu of Scott Coltrane while university Board of Trustees searched for a permanent president. After Michael Schill was named President and Scott Coltrane reassumed his position as provost, Bronet left the UO to become the provost at the Illinois Institute of Technology. Brooke Muller has been serving as Interim Dean since the search for a permanent replacement began.
Lindner is currently the Director of the University of Amsterdam’s Cities Project, a research project that focuses on cultural, historical, and geographic complexities of urban communities within city planning and architecture.
“Lindner stood out as the candidate whose background and academic work best compliments the incredible diversity of A&AA’s programs,” Coltrane wrote in his announcement, “With an academic focus on the relationship between cities, globalization, and issues of political ecology … Lindner is uniquely qualified to build consensus and craft a visionary 21st-century future for A&AA.”
Lindner is a founding director of the Netherlands Institute for Cultural Analysis and served as the director of the Amsterdam School for Cultural Analysis from 2010-14.
“A&AA is ideally positioned to be a global leader in the study of design, visual culture, and the built, natural, and social environments,” Lindner said in a prepared statement. “I am looking forward to working with everyone with everyone at A&AA, as well as with the wider UO community, in shaping this vision.”