Patrik Schumacher, architect and director of Zaha Hadid Architects in London, will be giving a lecture this Thursday, November 17th at 6pm in the Higgins Hall Auditorium with Ms. Hadid in attendance. Besides the internationally acclaimed work he has done assisting with Ms. Hadid’s work, his individual projects have snapped up awards around the world as well. Closing out the School of Architecture’s lecture series for the semester and the year, Mr. Schumacher is not to be missed.

Profile:

Patrik has been with our practice since 1988. He is company director and our Senior Designer, involved alongside Zaha Hadid herself in all projects we undertake. He maintains an active role in the development throughout the design phases.

Education:

Patrik studied architecture at the University of Stuttgart and at the SOuthbank University in London. He completed his architectural diploma and received his degree Dipl Ing from Stuttgart University in 1990. He also studied philosophy at Bonn and London Universities. In 1999, he received his PhD at the Institute for Cultural Sciences at the University of Klagenfurt.

^zahahadidarchitects

Links:

• architect’snewspaper _ the parametricist manifesto
• zahahadidarchitects _ bio
• patrickschumacher

Latin Pratt’s ‘Breaking Borders’ semester-long event wraps up this Monday, November 14th at 6pm with a lecture by Carlos JIMENEZ, an architect with his own firm, The Carlos Jimenez Studio, and is a professor at Rice University. Mr. Jimenez’s work includes the Rice University Data Center, the Tyler School of Art at Temple University, several residences, and a variety of upcoming projects.

Born in San Jose, Costa Rica (1959). Moved to United States in 1974. B-Arch (1981) from the University of Houston College of Architecture, receiving awards for best thesis and best portfolio. Establishes Carlos Jimenez Studio in Houston in 1983. Visiting professor at a number of Universities  in the United States and abroad such as Southern California Institute of Architecture, University of California at Los Angeles and Berkeley, Texas A&M University, Williams College, University of Navarra, Rice University, Graduate School of Design at Harvard University, Tulane University, University of Texas at Austin and Arlington, Tec de Monterrey at Queretaro, Veritas University and the University of Oregon, among others. Lecturer, Juror and Visiting Critic at academic and cultural institutions throughout the United States, Canada, Mexico, the Caribbean, Central and South America, Europe the Middle East and Japan. Contributes regularly to specialized journals. Tenured Professor at Rice University School of Architecture (2000). Jury member of the Pritzker Architecture Prize (2001-2011).

^carlosjimenezstudio

Carlos Jimenez, professor of architecture at Rice University and an internationally known architect, has combined a distinctive style of teaching and research into an award-winning blend. He is the recipient of the 2006 Charles W. Duncan Jr. Achievement Award for Outstanding Faculty, which recognizes accomplishment in scholarship and teaching.

Jimenez said architecture research doesn’t take place in a controlled environment or a sterile lab; it converges and combines with academics until it’s difficult to tell where one ends and the other begins.

“What’s different about architecture and a science like biochemistry is that the academic and research sides are intertwined into the built work,” he said. “Every architecture project by nature requires a great deal of research focused toward an optimum solution. Whether in my studio or in one of my studios at Rice, we conduct singularly focused research, and the building is evidence of that research. The level and quality of research is another measure of a project’s success or shortcomings.”

But research is only part of the reason Jimenez received the award.

“His dedication to teaching and to students is legendary,” said Lars Lerup, dean of architecture and the William

Ward Watkin Professor of Architecture. “Carlos is one of the most revered studio teachers in the school. His reputation as considerate and respectful and his interest in our community go far beyond the call of duty and make him an outstanding colleague.”

For Jimenez, instruction on the subject of architecture is filled with contradictions. “I try to teach my students to be highly agile and positive in their pursuit of architecture, free and respectful of the discipline’s vast built legacy, intrepid and cautious, citizens of their precise locality and of the world, ” he said.

Jimenez, who was born in Costa Rica, came to the U.S. in the 1970s and graduated from the University of Houston in 1981. After a brief partnership, he started his own studio in 1982. He became a visiting professor at Rice in 1987, and in 1996 he started teaching full time at the university. By that time, he was well-known with a substantial portfolio of work and many publications.

“Carlos Jimenez’s story is an American story, showing how vital immigrants are to our culture,” Lerup said. “We are truly privileged to have him among us.”

^riceuniversity

Pratt Institute School of Architecture and Latin Pratt will be hosting host a symposium titled “New Latin American Architecture: A Critical Panorama” on Monday, November 7, 2011, from 6 to 9 p.m. in Higgins Hall Auditorium at 61 Saint James Place. The symposium will be free and open to the public and will focus on the development of architecture in Latin America during the last decade and the future of architecture in Latin America.

The symposium will feature a panel discussion moderated by Ivan Rumenov Shumkov, Ph.D., adjunct associate professor at Pratt Institute and principal of Ivan Shumkov Architects; with panelists Barry Bergdoll, the Philip Johnson chief curator of architecture and design at the Museum of Modern Art and professor of architectural history at Columbia University; Alfredo Brillembourg, co-founder of Urban-Think Tank and chair of architecture and design at Zurich Institute of Technology; Ana Maria Duran Calisto, architect, researcher, and co-principal of Estudio A0; Kenneth Frampton, author, architect, and Ware Professor of Architecture at the Graduate School of Architecture, Planning, and Preservation at Columbia University; and Giancarlo Mazzanti Sierra, architect and a faculty member at Los Andes University in Bogotá, Colombia.

Please remember to bring your Pratt I.D. to gain entrance into the auditorium.

This Thursday November 3^rd at 6pm Pratt School of Architecture will present the Symposium ROME MATTERS in Higgins Hall Auditorium. A conversation with Pippo Ciorra, of Rome’s MAXXI Museum, Alicia Imperiale, of Temple University, Frederick Biehle, Pratt Professor and Rome Program Director, and Mark Ratansky, Pratt Professor. Moderating the symposium will be Jason Vigneri-Beane, director of the GAUD Rome Program.

Enrique Norten of TENARQUITECTOS will be speaking on Monday October 25^th at 6pm in Higgins Hall Auditorium as keynote speaker for Latin Pratt’s Breaking Borders exhibit.

Enrique Norten, Hon. FAIA was born in Mexico City where he graduated from the Universidad Iberoamericana with a degree in architecture in 1978. He obtained a Master of Architecture from Cornell University in 1980.

In 1986 he founded TEN Arquitectos [Taller de Enrique Norten Arquitectos] in Mexico City, initiating a lifelong commitment to Architecture and Design.

Among others awards, Enrique Norten was the first Mies van der Rohe Award recipient for Latin American Architecture in 1998, and in 2007 he obtained the “Legacy Award” from the Smithsonian Institution for his contributions to the US arts and culture. In 2005 he received the “Leonardo da Vinci” World Award of Arts by the World Cultural Council. Since 1997 he is an Honorary Fellow of the AIA and a member of the CAMSAM since 1986.

Enrique Norten has lectured all over the world in a diverse array of institutions and universities.

Throughout his career, he has balanced the practice of architecture with a constant participation on international juries and award committees such as the World Trade Center Site Memorial Competition in New York City.He is a regular member for the Holcim Foundation Awards for Sustainable Construction, the Deutsche Bank’s Board of Trustees and for the Zumtobel Group Award for Sustainability and Humanity in the Built Environment. On successive years he has become a board member of the Mexican Cultural Institute of New York and the Americas Society/Council of the Americas.

Enrique Norten holds the Miller Chair at the University of Pennsylvania since 1998. He has held the Lorch Professor of Architecture Chair at the University of Michigan, the O’Neal Ford Chair in Architecture at the University of Texas at Austin; he has been the Eliot Noyes Visiting Design Critic at Harvard University and the Distinguished Visiting Professor at Cornell University. He was professor of architecture at the Universidad Iberoamericana in Mexico City from 1980 to1990 and was coordinator of the Graduate Urban design Program from 1983 to 1985.

^tenarchitectos

Wolf Prix of Coop Himmelb(l)au will be speaking on Tuesday October 18^th at 6pm in Higgins Hall Auditorium.

As one of the co-founders of the world-renowned COOP HIMMELB(L)AU, architect Wolf Prix has won numerous prestigious awards for his structures as well as a host of other awards for his teaching. The firm’s latest projects include the European Central Bank and Denmark’s House of Music and Munich’s Pavilion 21 Mini-Opera Space.

Wolf D. Prix, born in Vienna in 1942, is a co-founder of COOP HIMMELB(L)AU. he studied architecture at the Vienna University of Technology, the Architectural Association of London, and the Southern California Institute of Architecture (SCI-Arc) in Los Angeles.

In 1993, Wolf D. Prix was named professor for Archiecture at the University of Applied Arts in Vienna, Austria. Since 2003, he has been head of the Institute for Architecture, the head of Studio Prix, and serves as vice-rector of the university.

He taught as a visiting professor at the architectural Association in London in 1984, and at Harvard University in Cambridge, Massachusetts in 1990. From 1985 to 1995, Wolf D. Prix was active as Adjunct Professor at the SCI-Arc in Los Angeles. Since 1998, he has been a faculty member at Columbia University in New York. In 1999, Wolf D. Prix was awarded the Harvey S. Perloff Professorship at The University of California Los Angeles (UCLA). In 2001, he was made an adjunct professor at UCLA. Since 2001 he has been a DOctor Honoris Causa de la Univesidad de Palermo, Buenos Aires, Argentina.

^coophimmelb(l)au

Los Angeles floats its landmarks on a sea of faceless highway, like peanuts in peanut brittle. Downtown, the two-block stretch of Grand Avenue that straddles the 101 is a satisfying bite. In a single chomp, you get Frank Gehry’s Disney concert hall, Rafael Moneo’s Our Lady of the Angels cathedral, and now, a new arts high school designed by Wolf Prix and Coop Himmelb(l)au.

It’s familiar territory for Prix. He studied at the Southern California Institute of Architecture in L.A. after stints at the Architectural Association in London and the Technische Universität in Vienna, his hometown.

L.A.’s brash exuberance suits him. One of Prix’s first projects with Coop Himmelb(l)au, the studio he co-founded in 1968, was a house in London with a roof pulled airborne by a giant balloon. He has fun with architecture—get put on hold calling his Vienna office and “Gimme Shelter” is the muzak—so if anyone could help flip the trend of institutionalized cement-gray high schools distinguishable only by the mascot on the marquee out front, it’s Prix.

Completed in October, the Central Los Angeles Area High School #9 is a pile of stainless-steel building blocks: a cone for the library, a lopsided pyramid for the main lobby, and a spiraling tower that echoes Moneo’s bell tower across the highway. A 950-seat public theater connects to the lobby, and four classroom buildings circle a central courtyard in a swirl of private and public space. The school looks stunning, glinting metallic in the SoCal sun across from Moneo’s earthy concrete walls—an impressive addition for traffic-jammed commuters to gawk at in this section of the city.

^archrecord

Links:

• artdirectory
• kettererkunst

Peter Bohlin of Bohlin Cywinski Jackson will be speaking on Monday October 16^th at 6pm in Higgins Hall Auditorium.

If you find Apple stores invigorating then you won’t want to miss their designer’s presentation. Peter Bohlin is an American architect and the winner of the 2010 Gold Medal of the American Institute of Architects. He is a Fellow of the American Institute of Architects and a founding principal of Bohlin Cywinski Jackson.

Bohlin Cywinski Jackson, founded in 1965, has offices in Wilkes-Barre, Pittsburgh, Philadelphia, Seattle and San Francisco. The firm’s work is known for exceptional design, for its commitment to the particularity of place and user, and for an extraordinary aesthetic based on a quiet rigor which is both intellectual and intuitive.

The firm’s work ranges greatly in scale and circumstance. Its architecture is alive to the subtleties of place — man-made or natural, to the varied natures of people, to the sensibilities of individuals, to the character of institutions, and to the rich possibilities of materials and the means of construction.

Bohlin Cywinski Jackson has received more than 490 regional, national and international awards for design. In 1994, the practice received the Architecture Firm Award from the American Institute of Architects. The firm’s work is published regularly in professional journals worldwide.

^bohlincywinskijackson

“The poignancy of the natural landscape,” says Peter Bohlin, acts as a primary stimulus to the architecture for which his firm has become internationally known. “We strive to create extraordinary places that fit, as well, the nature of each of our clients.” Bohlin Cywinski Jackson, a 42-year-old practice that has grown to 150 people and five offices—Philadelphia, Pittsburgh and Wilkes-Barre in Pennsylvania, Seattle and San Francisco—has been at the forefront of the “green” movement in building. “We’ve always viewed sustainable design as not only the right thing to do but also an opportunity to make richer and more powerful architecture,” Bohlin comments, noting the “innovations and increasing possibilities in the palette of materials”—largely wood, glass and steel—that he uses.

The firm has received more than 300 design awards for an aesthetic based on a quiet rigor that is equal parts intellectual and intuitive. The 1994 Architecture Firm Award given by the AIA cited Bohlin Cywinski Jackson’s scope of practice and body of work; that work continues to range in scale and building type from major institutional structures to the Apple stores worldwide to a collection of private residences. “Our goal on every project is to encompass both the practical and emotional elements of architecture in a sensitive response to the particular environment and circumstance.”

^architecturaldigest

Links:

• archdaily _ interview
• architecturalrecord
• wikipedia

Cecil Balmond will be speaking on Thursday October 6^th at 6pm in Higgins Hall Auditorium.

Cecil Balmond interrogates and applies advanced geometric thinking in how space can be organized and experienced. His dynamic and scaleless approach is informed by the science of complexity, non-linear organization and emergence of form.

Balmond has won many awards including the RIBA Charles Jencks Award for Theory in Practice, the Sir Banister Fletcher Prize for best book of the year on Architecture for Informal, and the prestigious Gengo Matsui prize for his design of the Serpentine Pavilion with Toyo Ito in 2002.

He has been Kenzo Tange Professor at the Harvard Graduate School of Architecture, Saarinen Professor at Yale University School of Architecture, Visiting Fellow at the London School of Economics, Cities Programme, and currently holds the Paul Philippe Cret Chair at Penn Design as Professor of Architecture. He is the founding director of the NSO at Penn, carrying out research into Non-Linear Systems’ Organisation.

^balmondstudio

Cecil Balmond is an internationally renowned designer, structural engineer, author and Deputy Chairman of the international, multi-disciplinary engineering firm Arup. One of his most recent projects is the 2006 Serpentine Gallery Pavilion, designed with Rem Koolhaas.

He has held several distinguished visiting professorships at leading universities in the United States and Britain: Saarinen Professor at Yale University, Kenzo Tange Visiting Critic at Harvard’s School of Design, visiting professor at the London School of Economics, and most recently the Graham Professor at the University of Pennsylvania. He received the Gengo Matsui Prize in 2002, which is the highest recognition for structural engineering given in Japan, and the Charles Jencks Award for Theory in Practice of the Royal Institute of British Architects in 2003. This spring he gave the Felix Candela lectures at the Museum of Modern Art and had an exhibition of his work at the arc en rêve centre d’architecture in Bordeaux, France. He is the author of Informal (Prestel, 2002), Number Nine (Prestel, 1998) and co-authored Serpentine Gallery Pavilion 2002 with Toyo Ito (Telescoweb.com, Japan), and Unfolding with Daniel Liebeskind (NAI, 1997).

Through his provocative designs in collaboration with leading architects and artists and eloquent writings, including Informal (2002) and Number Nine: The Search for the Sigma Code (1998) Balmond has put forward a dynamic and organizational approach to structure that is informed by the sciences of complexity, non-linear organization and emergence. Recognizing that the universe is a constantly changing array of patterns (both random and regular), he also draws on ancient wisdom and non-western mathematical archetypes. Taking structure to be as much a verb as a noun—as structuring, organizing and patterning—Balmond redefines the relationship between structural engineering and architecture beyond the ethos of rationalism, efficiency and optimization, which has characterized not only high-tech design but modern architecture in general. His experimental, constructive and algorithmic methods open a rich territory for design at different scales and in different media and regimes of matter, extending the horizons of both reason and beauty. To test their capabilities he is currently designing an urban master plan for a redevelopment site in London, while at the same time experimenting with rhythmic lighting effects and the generation of music.

^penndesign

Links

• wired
• ny times
• business week
• penn design

Pratt Institute
School of Undergraduate Architecture

Digital Futures Lecture Series

Foundations of Parametrics

Conductor:
Ted Ngai

Location:
Higgins Hall South 111

Date + Time:
Monday 2011.09.12
7-9pm

Description:
This lecture introduces the audience to the necessary mathematical concepts of parametric computing from a historical and cultural perspective. From the Egyptian establishment of a metric system that is used to measure earth, the origin of geometry that was created for the purpose of calculating farming areas for taxation; to stereotomy, an application of descriptive geometry that develops formal resolutions and descriptions of the curved space of vaults and arches. This lecture will introduce technical terminologies and important mathematical and spatial concepts that are critical to understanding the technology of parametric computing.

POSTER: df lecture 001

Monday, April 18^th at 6pm in the Higgins Hall Auditorium, the famous architect from Rome, Paolo Portoghesi, will be in conversation with GAUD’s Professor Catherine Ingraham. This event should prove to be a stimulating educational exercise. Please remember to bring your Pratt I.D.

Selected Works:

• Casa Baldi, Rome (1959)
• Casa Andreis Scandriglia (1964)
• Casa Bevilacqua (1964)
• Theatre of Cagliari (1965)
• Casa Papanice Roma (1966)
• Church of Sacra Famiglia, Salerno (1969)
• The Grand Hotel, Khartoum, Sudan (1972-73)
• Royal Court, Amman, Jordan (1973)
• Central mosque, Rome (1974) *pictured above
• Academy of Fine Arts, L’Aquila (1978-82)
• ENEL Condominium, Tarquinia (1981)
• Tegel residence, IBA Berlin, Germany (1984-88)
• Le terme di Montecatini, Pistoia (1987)
• The Politeama Theatre, Catanzaro (1988)
• The garden and library of Calcata (1990)
• La piazza Leon Battista Alberti, Rimini (1990)
• Church of Santa Maria della Pace, Terni (1997)
• Grande Mosque, Strasburg, France (2000)
• The Rinascimento in Talenti park, Rome (2001)
• The Montpellier Gardens (Lattes), France
• The Central American Parliament, Esquipulas, Guatemala
• The Primavera restaurant, Moscow, Russia
• Town Hall square, Pirmasens, Germany.
• Headquarters of the Royalties Institute, St. Peter’s College, Oxford, UK
• Public square, Shangai, China (2006)
• Strasbourg Mosque, due for completion 2011
• Cimitero Nuovo di Cesena, 2011

Links:

• Full List of Works