Mpho Matsipa

Mpho Matsipa is Adjunct Assistant Professor of Architecture at Columbia GSAPP and Curator at Studio-X Johannesburg. She is also a researcher at the Wits City Institute at the University of the Witwatersrand, South Africa. After completing her professional degree in Architecture at the University of Cape Town, with a distinction in design, Mpho was awarded a Fulbright Scholarship and later, a Carnegie Grant as a graduate student at the University of California, Berkeley. Her Ph.D. in Architecture, from the University of California, Berkeley, is titled The Order of Appearances explored the entangled geographies of urban informality, urban redevelopment and the politics of race, gender and aesthetics in Johannesburg’s inner city. Mpho has written critical essays and reviews on public art, culture and space for Art South Africa, the Architectural Review and Thesis 11 (forthcoming).

Mpho has worked as an architect and she has been shortlisted in two prestigious national design competitions. She has curated several exhibitions, including of the South Africa Pavilion at the 11th International Architecture Exhibition, Venice Biennale (2008), and she curates Studio-X Johannesburg, an experimental public platform on architecture and the city. Her research interests include globalization and urbanism in African cities, spatial justice, and culture, race and representation.