Archinect - News

Live chat with David Chipperfield as La Biennale di Venezia closes

2012-11-21T13:30:00-05:00

On the occasion of the quickly approaching closing weekend of the 13th International Architecture Exhibition Common Ground at La Biennale di Venezia, the online community gets the chance to talk interactively in a live chat with David Chipperfield, curator of the exhibition.

The live stream starts at 6pm (Central European Time) on Friday, November 23rd and can be accessed at biennalearchitettura.telecomitalia.com.

David Chipperfield Deplores the “Impotence” of Contemporary Architecture at the London Design Festival

2012-09-25T18:30:00-04:00

Chipperfield lamented how architects have resorted to designing bars, cafes, restaurants, and interiors and criticized the propagation of the discipline as fodder for the “lifestyle pages” in popular media. To him, the role of architecture and design is diminishing into nothing more than an “anesthetic” and a “palliative” in a larger economic crisis, rather than stepping up as a means to address serious socioeconomic problems: “I feel more and more impotent in really doing things..."

Inside the homes of David Chipperfield, Rod Sheard and Sheila O'Donnell, and John Tuomey

2012-09-24T21:03:00-04:00

They are happy to lay down the law on what makes a good stadium, tower block or concert hall, but do architects practise what they preach when it comes to their own homes? We go through the keyhole to meet three nominees for the hotly contested RIBA Stirling prize

Chipperfield counters Prix's Venice Biennale criticism

2012-09-07T17:37:00-04:00

In a letter titled ‘Kicking against the Prix’, the RIBA gold medallist claimed the Coop Himmelb(l)au founder had failed to attend the biennale despite issuing a critical press release last week describing it as ‘banal’.

David Chipperfield’s full letter

I am disappointed that our British architectural press should give so much coverage to the destructive opinions of a Viennese architect about the Biennale, even though he hadn’t even visited Venice.

My concerns are not about the criticism, which I didn’t understand, but that this statement and the ensuing ‘controversy’ stimulated by its publication reinforce the negative attitudes of our architectural culture. Wolf Prix demonstrates no interest in the position of others and only imagines that architecture can conform to his own priorities and preconceptions.

This year’s Biennale, with all its weaknesses and mistakes, was above all conceived and realised in a spirit of generosity, optimistically proposing that there is an architectural culture bound together by shared intentions, influences and disappointments and that even the most celebrated protagonists of our profession are capable of engaging in such a dialogue.

When I began to formulat...

Wolf Prix attacks Chipperfield's 'banal' Venice Biennale

2012-08-29T21:14:00-04:00

Labelling the festival an ‘expensive dance of death’, the Coop Himmelb(l)au-founder went on to claim a ‘great’ biennale would have featured forums and themes looking ‘behind the scenes’ at decision-making ‘instead of boring exhibitions’.

Better source at Building Design, but their need for registration denies access to many.

Menil Collection plans new building for Drawing Institute; four architecture firms named as finalists

2012-04-13T15:47:00-04:00

Four finalists have emerged from the Menil Collection's extensive international search to select an architect to design its Menil Drawing Institute (MDI), the first major project to be built as a part of the museum's long-range master plan.

After several years of site visits, careful research and thoughtful interviews, the Menil's architecture selection committee has announced a short list of long-established and newly-emerging architectural firms:

Tatiana Bilbao — up-and-coming Mexico City architect with a number of high-profile projects under her belt, including a building co-designed with artist Gabriel Orozco
David Chipperfield Architects — renowned London-based firm behind the Menil's 2009 master plan as well as the stunning Figge Art Museum in Iowa
Johnston Marklee — design duo from Los Angeles known for its ultramodern nods to architectural history
SANAA — Tokyo-based designers behind the Toledo Museum of Art's Glass Pavilion and winners of the 2010 Pritzker Prize

David Chipperfield to Renovate Berlin’s Neue Nationalgalerie

2012-04-04T15:30:00-04:00

The British architect David Chipperfield will oversee a major renovation of Berlin’s Neue Nationalgalerie, a concrete, steel and glass landmark at Potsdamer Platz completed by Ludwig Mies van der Rohe in 1968. Chipperfield has worked extensively in Berlin, finishing work on the war-ravaged Neues Museum on the Museum Island complex in 2009.

David Chipperfield to curate 2012 Venice Biennale

2011-11-10T18:29:00-05:00

When his appointment is officially announced, the British architect – renowned for his cool, clear almost chaste designs, most notably his recent Turner Contemporary in Margate and the Hepworth Wakefield in Yorkshire – will have just eight months to come up with a theme for two huge group shows: one in the former rope works of the Arsenale; the other in the nearby Giardini.

Click here to see more Archinect News posts related to the 13th International Architecture Exhibition of the Venice Biennale.

Chipperfield talks architectural balance

2011-11-04T13:11:37-04:00

"It was a shock to come out [of graduate school] and realize [modern architects] were a public enemy,” Chipperfield said. This “hostile public opinion,” he said, was the result of poor work by the previous generation of architects, whose bad reputation became projected onto Chipperfield and his contemporaries. Furthermore, the damage to England’s monuments and other edifices caused in World War II contributed to the public’s grim outlook on architecture, he added.

No shades of grey in this bold vision

2011-06-06T18:50:26-04:00

Chipperfield... says creating the gallery was like “a three-dimensional jigsaw puzzle” and there’s certainly a lot of geometry involved. More important, though, there’s an uplifting sense of space, height and – exactly what you don’t expect from the exterior – light. The rooms are flooded with light reflected off white walls, from skylights and from floor-to-ceiling windows that counterpoint the sculptures with the urban reality of Wakefield outside.

Chipperfield's Neues Museum renovation snags Mies van der Rohe award

2011-04-11T18:26:50-04:00

David Chipperfield’s revamp of the Neues Museum in Berlin has won the 2011 European Union Prize for Contemporary Architecture – the Mies van der Rohe Award.

BDonline broke the news that architect David Chipperfield has received the Mies van der Rohe award for his working on the restoration of the Neues Museum in Berlin: a cash prize of 60,000€. The 2011 jury included Mohsen Mostafavi, Ole Bouman, Annette Gigon, Yvonne Farrell, Zhu Pei and Tarald Lundevall.

"The rebuilding of the Neues Museum is an extraordinary achievement. Rarely have an architect and client succeeded in undertaking a work of such historic importance and complexity; especially one that involves both preservation and new building. The project raises and addresses many aesthetic, ethical, and technical issues. It is an exemplary demonstration of what collaboration can achieve in the context of contemporary European architectural practice." --Mohsen Mostafavi

Previous winners of the awards include Norwegian National Opera & Ballet by SNØHETTA, Contemporary Art Museum of Castilla y León by Mansilla+Tuñón Arquitectos and Netherlands Embassy Berlin by Rem Koolhaas and El...

Stirling Prize Winner

2007-10-06T21:46:00-04:00

Seems like Foster's protégé beat him to the Stirling Prize. David Chipperfield takes the 2007 award