Mesarch | research laboratory

http://mesarch.ucy.ac.cy

Mesarch is a research laboratory focusing on the history and theory of Modern Architecture in the Eastern Mediterranean

The term mesarch is an amalgam of different meanings: Mesogeios (Greek word for Mediterrenean), Middle East, Architecture and Archive. The term also exists in Botanology as “the maturing of the center toward both the interior and exterior,” and in many ways, this is also in tune with the mesarch’s premise that its research should steer clear of center-periphery models to treat Eastern Mediterranean’s histories of modernism as complexly entangled with histories of European and other modernisms.

Mesarch is conducting critical research on the interdisciplinary fields of:

- Architecture/urbanism and politics in 20th Century Eastern Mediterranean

- Histories of urban development and environmental sustainability, cultural heritage, memory and conflict

- Digital humanities and architectural archives

Mesarch has launched programs of historical and archival research that focus on the Architecture and Modernization Histories of Cyprus and situate Cyprus and its modern architecture within international scholarly debates.