Architecture of Life, the inaugural exhibition at the UC Berkeley Art Museum and Pacific Film Archive's (BAMPFA) new building in downtown Berkeley, explores the ways that architecture—as concept, metaphor, and practice—illuminates various aspects of life experience: the nature of the self and psyche, the fundamental structures of reality, and the power of the imagination to reshape our world. Occupying every gallery in a new building designed by Diller Scofidio + Renfro, the exhibition comprises over two-hundred works of art in a wide range of media, as well as scientific illustrations, architectural drawings, and models, drawn from an array of cultures and made over the past thousand years.

Among many other artists, architects, scientists, and composers are works by: Wilson Bentley, Lee Bontecou, Louise Bourgeois, Marcel Duchamp, Diller Scofidio + Renfro, Buckminster Fuller, Frederick Kiesler, Toyo Ito, Johannes Itten, Viktor Schauberger, Lebbeus Woods, and Iannis Xenakis.

Exhibition curator and director Lawrence Rinder has had a prominent career in both the curatorial and educational sides of museums. He began his career as an educational consultant at the Museum of Modern Art before coming to Berkeley, where he was MATRIX Curator at the Museum from 1988 to 1998, organizing an ongoing series of exhibitions of contemporary art, and then assistant director for audience and programs, from 1997 to 1998. From 1998 to 2000, Rinder was founding director of the Institute for Exhibitions and Public Programs at California College of the Arts (CCA), before joining the Whitney Museum of American Art as a curator of contemporary art. He remained at the Whitney for four years before returning to CCA as dean of Graduate Studies and, later, dean of the College. Rinder has published and lectured widely and is board chair of the Andy Warhol Foundation for the Visual Arts.

The University of California, Berkeley Art Museum and Pacific Film Archive (BAMPFA) was founded in 1963. The mission of BAMPFA is to inspire the imagination and ignite critical dialogue through art and film. Through art and film programs, collections and research resources, we aspire to be locally connected and globally relevant, engaging audiences from the campus, community, and beyond.