Presently she is a professor at the Institute of Art History in Vienna, Austria and a senior researcher at the Austrian Academy of Sciences.
In collaboration with the Indian architect Richard A. Barraud she conducted major surveys of the palaces and gardens of Shah Jahan, reconstructed the Mughal city of Agra, and produced the first, comprehensive documentation of the Taj Mahal.
Through this work, Koch has developed one of the largest archives of photographs and measured drawings of the Islamic architecture of the Indian subcontinent.
Architecture and art emerge as a means of communication, through a topos of symbols, and like language and literature, they represent vital clues in the study of cultural and political history.
In her work with the Mughal Empire, informed by written sources, she utilises the art historian’s technique of formal analysis: utilising elements of the aesthetics of art, architectural form, building type, garden and urban design to form an understanding of the period.