Serendipities, practicalities and festivities
Embarking on the Australian Institute of Architects’ ninetieth year, one of my first tasks in January’s diverting calmness was to reach out to a longstanding member. I telephoned Vladimir Perm at his home town near Nice, France, on the morning of his ninetieth birthday, 11 January. Conversing with a member who has witnessed the rise of modernism, brutalism, critical regionalism, postmodernism and deconstructivism was fascinating.
This serendipity propelled me to see which other significant architects were born in 1931. As I discovered, they include: Italy’s first Pritzker Prize-winner and leading postmodernist, Aldo Rossi; his countryman Alessandro Mendini, influential two-time director of Domus; the UK’s early proponent of sustainability and social awareness, Edward (Ted) Cullinan; Finland’s Tuomo Suomalainen, who, with brother Timo, designed one of their homeland’s most visited sites, the rock-embedded Temppeliaukio Church; Rhodesian-born Denise Scott Brown, credited (with husband, collaborator and joint American Institute Gold Medallist Robert Venturi) for changing the way architects look at buildings, cities and landscapes;
Ricardo Legorreta, dual (International Union of Architects and American Institute of Architects) Gold Medallist, a bold modernist deeply rooted in the Mexican vernacular; Japan’s Arata Isozaki, Pritzker Prize-winner and Royal Institute of British Architects Gold Medallist; and, in Australia, Peter Brian Hall, inextricably linked to the completion of the Sydney Opera House.
Structural ninetieth birthdays proved no less impressive: New Delhi’s Viceroy’s House (Sir Edwin Lutyens);
New York’s Empire State Building (William F. Lamb); Paris’s Villa Savoye (Le Corbusier and his cousin, Pierre Jeanneret); and the Sydney Harbour Bridge (engineer Dr John Bradfield).
Other esteemed elders on our members register may expect to be called on their birthdays, as I hope some may agree to participate in SONA and EmAGN’s ninetieth anniversary interviews. If you know an eminent practitioner who would welcome, value or even tolerate a short interview, please inform me (president@ architecture.com.au).
Internationally, I also caught up with American Institute President Peter Exley during the summer recess to explore areas for collaboration. We are cooperating to gain presidential support for the preservation of vulnerable twentiethcentury heritage, including Louis Kahn’s dormitory buildings for Ahmedabad’s Indian Institute of Management.
Our national and chapter member committees are invaluable in shaping the Institute’s priorities, and I thank the members who generously partake. My ambition is for representatives from each national committee to address National Council annually. This initiative began in November 2020 with presentations from the Gender Equity Committee and the Sustainability Committee.
I have proudly overseen the establishment of our First Nations Working Group and Advisory Panel.
These repositories of expertise will provide much-needed guidance towards enhancing First Nations involvement in every aspect of the Institute’s operations.
As International Women’s
Day approaches on 8 March, articles bemoaning women’s under-representation in civic awards have peppered the popular press, with the Governor-General acknowledging the need to redress this imbalance. I applaud our National Gender Equity Committee for establishing an Awards and Honours Taskforce to increase female participation in Institute awards and broader representation in civic awards.
The National Heritage Committee has reconvened, after a decade, with two representatives from each chapter and a standing invitation for fledglings to attend. The committee will review and rewrite our Heritage Policy, consider accreditation to recognize conservation expertise, promote listing of significant twentieth-century buildings (including Sir Zelman Cowen Award-winners) and move to archive the Institute’s records for posterity.
As the 2021 Chapter Awards Program approaches, all chapters will have their own medal or medallion. Already a staple for some chapters, National Council recently approved medallion names for Tasmania, South Australia and the International Chapter. Magnificent extant examples range from Victoria’s platter-scaled medal to the ACT’s elegantly bifurcated bronze disc, while an abstraction of van der Rohe’s German Pavilion forms the European Union’s Mies Prize Award. I am therefore feverishly anticipating the form and materialization of these new medallions. To further the Institute’s advocacy and public engagement, I suggest that each chapter’s named awards would benefit from acknowledgement by plaques, proudly displayed on award-winning buildings for the public to discover and appreciate.