Archinect - News

Over a half million visitors attended the second Chicago Architecture Biennial

2018-01-17T14:06:00-05:00

The recently concluded 2017 Chicago Architecture Biennial saw over 550,000 visitors. Artistic Directors Sharon Johnston and Mark Lee, of the LA-based firm Johnston Marklee, selected 140 architects and designers from 20 countries to participate. Among the vast number of attendees the biennial also boasts engagement of more than 10,000 students.

Mayor Rahm Emanuel announced, "The second Chicago Architecture Biennial reinforced Chicago's reputation as the vanguard of architectural, art and design innovation on the national and international stage".

Offering over 273 public programs, the event featured exhibitions by the Alphawood Foundation, Graham Foundation, Art Institute of Chicago and the Museum of Contemporary Art Chicago. The Biennial will return September 19, 2019 and run through January 5, 2020, again in line with EXPO CHICAGO.

SCI-Arc Celebrates a School Year’s Culmination and Welcomes Another

2017-10-03T12:37:00-04:00

This post is brought to you by Southern California Institute of Architecture (SCI-Arc).

Since its founding in 1972 as an independent school of architecture, SCI-Arc has developed a series of idiosyncrasies that have anecdotally permeated the broader architecture community. Prominent among these is hosting its cap and gown-less Graduation in the middle of September-- literally an hour after its last review of the academic year and a week after the first pin ups of the new school year. This means that September is the most dynamic time of the year at SCI-Arc as it concurrently welcomes in a new class of undergraduate, graduate and postgraduate students and bids farewell to its latest generation of architects eager and ready to imagine and shape the future.

SCI-Arc’s 2017 graduation ceremony was held on Sunday, September 10 and featured a commencement address by architect Marion Weiss, cofounder of WEISS/MANFREDI and B.Arch Graduate Deborah Garcia ’17.

A celebration of student ach...

The recipients of the 2016 Graham Foundations grants announced

2016-08-10T13:18:00-04:00

The Graham Foundation has announced the winners of their annual grants to organizations. In total, the grants amount to $419,000 and will support 31 projects, ranging from exhibitions to site-specific commissions and publications. The winning projects were selected out of a pool of 230 submissions.

"Operating on a variety of scales, these grants give voice to innovative programs and scholarship, and create new platforms for engagement with architecture and its role in the arts, culture, and society," the Graham Foundation states in the press release.

Here are the grantees and their projects:

Anyone Corporation
The Architectural Imagination: US Pavilion, 15th International Architecture Exhibition
Exhibition

the Bronx Museum of the Arts
Gordon Matta-Clark: Anarchitect
Exhibition

California State University Long Beach—University Museum
Robert Irwin: Site Determined
Exhibition

Contemporary Art Museum St. Louis
Urban Planning: Contemporary Art and the City, 1966-2017
Exhibition

Istanbul Foundation for ...

MOCA Announces New Performance Festival for Downtown LA

2014-08-28T21:02:00-04:00

This month, audiences will be able to check out the first program to emerge from Vergne's nascent administration: Step and Repeat, a multidisciplinary festival of performing arts, takes place at the Geffen Contemporary at MOCA over four Saturday evenings, beginning Sept. 13 [...] Step and Repeat will feature a unique nightly lineup of poetry readings, noise/experimental music, performance art, stand-up comedy, live bands and deejays, all presented side by side.

The news that performance and other public programming will return to the Museum of Contemporary Art (MOCA) is a sign for some that the new director, Philippe Vergne, is already returning the embattled museum to its former strength. Vergne replaced the former director Jeffrey Deitch, whose stewarding of the institution provoked controversy and ended in his resignation. Some contended that Deitch oriented the museum too much around pop culture and celebrity, with exhibits like "Rebel" featuring the work of James France and "Art in the Streets" about graffiti. When he announced a show about disco, prestigious artists like Ed Ruscha and Barbara Kruger resigned from the museum board.

MOCA has a long history of being an "artist's museum," due to the active and experimental role of artists in its programming. For example, the ongoing MOCAtv showcases the works of artists who have not necessarily fully broken into the mainstream, such as the recent episodes by the Jogging or Ed Fornieles...