Archinect - News

Rachel Whiteread brings American Suburbia to London

2018-01-16T13:06:00-05:00

A major new public art work by Rachel Whiteread modelled on a suburban US house will be unveiled next week at the new US Embassy in Nine Elms, south London. The wall sculpture, titled US Embassy (Flat pack house; 2013-1015), will greet embassy visitors as they enter into the lobby through the consular court. The work was commissioned by Art in Embassies, a US governmental body.

Artist Rachel Whiteread's name has become synonymous with the production of architectural interventions, invention and material playfulness through her large-scale artist sculptures, specifically her casts of the interiors of buildings. Her newest addition, installed in the US Embassy titled, US Embassy (Flat pack house; 2013-1015) in London is no exception.

The large-scale sculpture will be on display at the US Embassy in London and consists of a collection of concrete interior casts of a traditional American suburban home, interiors of a traditional mid-century suburban home from America. Each nuance, crack, crevice and plethora of formal elements are frozen in time within the casts and subsequently hung vertically on embassy walls.

Artist Rachel Whiteread creates two "ghost" cabins in the desert outside of Los Angeles

2017-07-25T12:15:00-04:00

Rachel Whiteread is known for her architecturally-relevant art practice, in particular her casts of the inside of buildings. One such sculpture, a cast of a Victorian townhouse, helped secure her the Turner Prize, making her the first woman to ever win the illustrious award.

The London-based artist has reprised this strategy for two installations in the California High Desert, which are featured in WSJ. Magazine. Located near Joshua Tree National Park, her concrete sculptures reveal the negative space of small cabins from the 1950s that had been left in the desert.

Photography by Iwan Baan for WSJ. Magazine

These aren’t the only sculptures to have recently touched down in the arid landscape outside of Los Angeles. A slew of artists, including Doug Aitken, gathered together a couple months ago to create Desert X, which was something of a festival of contemporary, site-specific works.

RIBA 2016 Stirling Prize Shortlist announced: includes Herzog & de Meuron, Wilkinson Eyre

2016-07-13T19:02:00-04:00

What does it take for a project to transcend from merely eye-catching architecture to a lasting, inspirational, nationally acclaimed building? The RIBA Stirling Prize, which awards the UK's best new building each year, has narrowed 2016's contenders down to a shortlist of six (two of which, the Weston Library by Wilkinson Eyre and Loyn & Co's Inside Outside House, were predicted for this list by Archinect's Ellen Hancock), which it announced today.

The list follows the National Awards and London Awards earlier this year, and comprises of some “usual suspects” shortlisted in previous years, as well as some newcomers; including previous winners Wilkinson Eyre and Herzog & de Meuron, and returning nominees Reiach and Hall, Caruso St John, and dRMM.

Nominees Michael Laird Architects and Loyn & Co Architects are relative newcomers, bringing (respectively) an education project and a private residence to the shortlist—the first private home to be nominated in 15 years. This year’s shortlist ...