Professor of Architecture and Urban Design José Gámez has been named interim dean of the College of Arts + Architecture. His appointment begins on July 1, following the departure of Dean Brook Muller.
Gámez joined the College of Arts + Architecture in 2002 as an assistant professor of architecture and has since served in multiple leadership positions, most recently as Associate Dean for Research and Graduate Programs. He has served as the Interim Director of the David R. Ravin School of Architecture, as the Associate Director of the School, as a Provost Faculty Fellow, and as a Research Fellow with both UNC Charlotte’s Institute for Social Capital and Urban Institute.
Gámez also has a long history of professional leadership and in July will begin serving as the Second Vice President of the Association of Collegiate Schools of Architecture.
His research explores questions of culture in architecture and urbanism through action-based research and public scholarship. His work has been published in Aztlán: A Journal of Chicano Studies, Places: A Forum of Environmental Design, The Journal of Urbanism, The Journal of Applied Geography, and The Plan Journal. He is also the co-editor of the books Rio de Janeiro: Urban Expansion and Environment and Vertical Urbanism: Designing Compact Cities in China and has contributed essays to books such as Writing Urbanism: A Design Reader, Expanding Architecture: Design as Activism, Charlotte, NC: The Global Rise of a New South City, and Latino Urbanism: The Politics of Planning, Policy and Redevelopment. His design contributions to the work of assemblageSTUDIO have been featured in New Museums: Contemporary Museum Architecture Around the World, Models: Architecture and the Miniature and Architectural Record. In 2015 Gámez was the recipient of the Provost’s Award for Community Engagement.
Gámez received his Bachelor of Environmental Design from Texas A&M University, his Master of Architecture from the University of California Berkeley, and his Ph.D. in Architecture and Urban Design from the University of California at Los Angeles.
Lee Gray, who had previously been named interim dean of the College of Arts + Architecture, will remain in his position as senior associate provost. A national search for the permanent dean of the College of Arts + Architecture is underway, chaired by Asher Haines, associate provost in the School of Professional Studies.