Staff Profile

Henry Urbach, Helen Hilton Raiser Curator of Architecture and Design

In September 2006, SFMOMA appointed Henry Urbach as the museum's Helen Hilton Raiser Curator of Architecture and Design. Urbach came to SFMOMA from New York, where he owned and directed Henry Urbach Architecture, a gallery of contemporary art and architecture that he founded in 1997.

Urbach has vast experience as a curator, teacher, lecturer, and published writer. His past curatorial projects, in addition to more than 50 exhibitions at his gallery, include Latent Space at Netherlands Architecture Institute, Rotterdam (2002); 2 x 2 at Apex Art, New York (2004); and Paradise 8 at Exit Art, New York (1999). Henry Urbach Architecture represented and exhibited many important artists and architects, including Aziz + Cucher, Richard Barnes, Marco Brambilla, Stephen Dean, Diller + Scofidio, E. V. Day, Langlands & Bell, An Te Liu, LOT-EK, Le Corbusier, Neal Rock, Lindy Roy, Ezra Stoller, and Lebbeus Woods. Urbach also served on curatorial and advisory panels for Exit Art, Artists Space, the Storefront for Art and Architecture, the Architectural League of New York, and the Whitney Museum of American Art.

Urbach received a master's degree in architecture from Columbia University in 1990. He earned his bachelor's degree in the history and theory of architecture from Princeton University, magna cum laude, in 1984. In 1995 Urbach received a master's degree in the history and theory of architecture from Princeton, where he is currently a PhD candidate.

Urbach has been published in many journals and books devoted to architectural history, theory, and criticism, including Assemblage, ANY, Gender Space Architecture, The Journal of Architecture, Scroope: Cambridge Architecture Journal, and Sites. He has written catalogue essays about the work of Interim Office of Architecture, LOT-EK, Simon Ungers, and numerous other architects. He served as a contributing editor for Interior Design magazine from 1997 to 2001, and he has written for Metropolis, The Village Voice, Design Book Review, Artforum, and The New York Times Magazine.