English architectural writer, critic, and educator Kenneth Frampton will receive the honorable Golden Lion for Lifetime Achievement award during the 2018 Venice Architecture Biennale next month. Frampton was selected by the Board of the Venice Biennale, upon recommendation of 2018 Biennale curators Yvonne Farrell and Shelley McNamara. 

Trained as an architect at the Architectural Association School of Architecture, Frampton is the Ware Professor of Architecture at the Columbia University GSAPP, where he has taught at since 1972. Over the years, he has also taught at the Royal College of Art in London, ETH Zurich, the Berlage Institute in Amsterdam, EPFL in Lausanne, and the Accademia di Architettura in Mendrisio.

He has written numerous essays and books on modern and contemporary architecture, including influential titles like the “Modern Architecture: A Critical History”, “Towards a Critical Regionalism”, “Studies on Tectonic Culture”, and “A Genealogy of Modern Architecture: Comparative Critical Analysis of Built Form”. He has also served on multiple international juries for architectural awards and building commissions.

“Through his work, Kenneth Frampton occupies a position of extraordinary insight and intelligence combined with a unique sense of integrity. He stands out as the voice of truth in the promotion of key values of architecture and its role in society. His humanistic philosophy in relation to architecture is embedded in his writing and he has consistently argued for this humanistic component throughout all the various ‘movements’ and trends often misguided in architecture in the 20th and 21st century,” said Yvonne Farrell and Shelley McNamara in recommending Frampton. “His experience as a practicing architect has given him a deep understanding of the process of designing and crafting buildings. This makes him both more sympathetic and more critical of the various forms of the practice of architecture. His consistent values in relation to the impact of architecture on society, together with his intellectual generosity, position him as a uniquely important presence in the world of architecture.”

Frampton will be presented with the Golden Lion during an awards ceremony at Ca'Giustinian on May 26, the first day of the Biennale.