Bridging the expanded fields of art and architecture, Esther M. Choi’s work as an artist and a historian primarily follows two strands: first, how concepts of nature have shaped and been shaped by the aesthetic and narrative conventions of Western worldmaking practices; and second, the potential for dialogical and televisual aesthetics to generate experimental structures of social engagement.
As a historian and theorist of architecture, she is broadly concerned with the cultural and aesthetic foundations of sensibilities on biological life, environment, and climate. Choi is currently a Getty/ACLS Postdoctoral Fellow in the History of Art, and working on a book tentatively titled, The Organization of Life. Based on extensive archival research, the book offers a close reading of modern art and architecture's close ties to the biological sciences—and the Modern Synthesis, in particular—in interwar Britain.
Choi is the co-editor of two books: Architecture At the Edge of Everything Else (MIT Press, 2010) and Architecture Is All Over (Columbia University, 2017). Her writing has been published in Artforum, E-Flux, Art Papers, Journal of Architectural Education, and Architectural Review. She is the creator of the artist’s book Le Corbuffet (Prestel, 2019), which was nominated for a James Beard Award for Photography. Her work has been supported by the Ford Foundation, Canada Council for the Arts, Richard Rogers Fellowship, Society of Architectural Historians, Graham Foundation, Princeton University, Harvard University, and others.