Overview

Rizzoli Bookstore in New York is hosting a panel conversation and book signing to celebrate the publication of Architecture x Architecture: A Dialectic, a new monograph by MAP (Metropolitan Architectural Practice). The event takes place on May 20, 2026, and belongs to the fields of architectural theory, generative AI, digital design methodology, and interdisciplinary practice.

Focus

The book and the panel conversation it anchors examine the relationship between generative AI and architectural design practice during the period 2022 to 2024. MAP frames this as a critical dialectic: not a celebration of AI tools, but an interrogation of how synthetic vision and machine-generated imagery are reshaping the conceptual and visual lexicon of architecture. The book introduces the concept of “neo-ecologies,” positioning architecture as an evolving interface within a shifting digital, spatial, and cultural matrix rather than a static built form.

For those tracking how the profession is reckoning with AI as both a design tool and a theoretical challenge, ArchUp’s coverage of AI in architecture and its transformation of design practice provides a useful frame on the disciplinary stakes the book is addressing.

Program

The event runs from 6:00 to 7:45 PM, with doors opening at 5:30 PM. It features a panel conversation with three participants: Katherine Lambert, co-founder of MAP and professor whose work integrates material precision, ecological intelligence, and synthetic vision across built practice and research; Christiane Robbins, co-founder and research director of MAP Studio, whose work as a media artist and scholar has been exhibited at MoMA, the Whitney Museum, the Venice Biennale, and the São Paulo Biennial; and Jack Murphy, editor in chief of The Architect’s Newspaper and AN Interior. The conversation will be followed by a book signing.

The monograph documents MAP’s projects from 2022 to 2024, using visual analysis to map the origins and escalation of generative AI within architectural practice, and argues that AI functions not as a sustaining force but as a catalyst that redefines contemporary architectural paradigms. Those following how AI is changing the nature of design authorship will find a relevant critical reference in ArchUp’s coverage of how architects are responding to the real risks of artificial intelligence, which tracks the profession’s uneven engagement with the technology.

“Architecture is not solely built form but a dynamic entity, deeply enmeshed in a network of digital and cultural exchanges that expand the field’s horizon of possibilities.”

The book is published by Rizzoli and available for signed copies via the Rizzoli Bookstore for those unable to attend. For broader context on how generative AI tools are entering everyday architectural practice, ArchUp’s analysis of the top AI tools currently used by architects and designers maps the practical landscape around which MAP’s more theoretical argument is positioned.

Audience

The event is open to the public and relevant to architects, designers, theorists, educators, and anyone engaged with the intersection of digital technology, artificial intelligence, and architectural practice. RSVPs are encouraged but not required. Seating is limited and will be first come, first served.

Event Details

✦ ArchUp Editorial Insight

MAP’s framing of generative AI as a dialectical force rather than a design tool marks a methodologically distinct position in a conversation that has become increasingly polarised between enthusiasts and sceptics. The concept of neo-ecologies is interesting precisely because it refuses to resolve the tension between AI and architectural authorship: instead of asking whether AI helps or harms design, it asks what kind of entity architecture becomes when it is enmeshed in digital and cultural networks that were not there before. This is a more intellectually serious question than most AI-and-architecture discourse manages to pose. The panel’s composition is also worth noting: Lambert brings built practice, Robbins brings media theory and international exhibition history, and Murphy brings editorial criticism. That triangulation between making, theorising, and critiquing is more productive than the typical format of a single practitioner presenting their own AI experiments. The limitation is the format itself: a 105-minute bookstore conversation is unlikely to resolve the questions the book raises, but at this moment in the discipline’s engagement with AI, raising the right questions publicly is itself a contribution.

Closing Note

The event is modest in scale but addresses a question that the architecture profession has not yet found adequate frameworks to answer. Its positioning at Rizzoli, one of the few remaining bookstores with a serious architecture programme in New York, gives it a cultural register that a university lecture hall would not.