photo credit Vicens Gimenez

She Brings Extensive Knowledge of the Practice, Art, and Ideas of Architecture

Tom Pritzker, president of the Hyatt Foundation, announced today that Barcelona-based architect Benedetta Tagliabue has joined the jury of The Pritzker Architecture Prize. Mr. Pritzker said, “We are very pleased to welcome Benedetta Tagliabue to the jury. She brings new perspectives and a deep and international knowledge of the best in architecture today.” From her studio in Barcelona, Tagliabue said, “The Pritzker Prize has become the award that points out the most important directions in architecture. For more than 35 years, quality in architecture at all scales and regardless of firm size has been the outstanding value of the prize. I feel incredibly honored to be part of the jury and I am looking forward to sharing ideas and beautiful moments with my colleagues.” From London, the chair of the jury, Lord Peter Palumbo, stated, “I am delighted that Benedetta Tagliabue has agreed to join the jury of The Pritzker Architecture Prize. Her distinction as an architect and her deep knowledge of the history of architecture will be invaluable to the deliberations of the jury.”

Benedetta Tagliabue is director of the acclaimed international architecture firm EMBT Miralles Tagliabue, founded in 1994 in collaboration with Enric Miralles, based in Barcelona and, since 2010, in Shanghai. Among her most notable built projects are the Scottish Parliament in Edinburgh, Diagonal Mar Park, and the Santa Caterina market in Barcelona, Campus Universitario de Vigo, and the Spanish Pavilion at the 2010 Shanghai World Expo which was awarded the prestigious RIBA International “Best International Building of 2011” award.

Current studio projects include The Business School of Fudan University in Shanghai, office towers in Taiwan and Taichung, public spaces of HafenCity in Hamburg, Germany, and official protection dwellings in Madrid. Her studio works in the fields of Architecture, design of public spaces, rehabilitation, interior and industrial design.

Tagliabue’s poetic architecture, always attentive to its context, has won international awards in the fields of public space and design. In the teaching field, she has been a visiting professor at Harvard University, Columbia University and Barcelona ETSAB, lecturing regularly at architecture forums and universities, and is on juries around the world, e.g. the Príncipe de Asturias awards.

Her work received the RIBA Stirling Prize in 2005, the National Spanish Prize in 2006, the Catalan National prize in 2002, City of Barcelona prize in 2005 and 2009, FAD prizes in 2000, 2003 and 2007. She recently won the 2013 RIBA Jencks Award, which is given annually to an individual or practice that has recently made a major contribution internationally to both the theory and practice of architecture.

Tagliabue studied architecture at the Istituto di Architettura di Venezia (IUAV). She is the director of the Enric Miralles Foundation, whose goal is to promote experimental architecture in the spirit of her late husband and partner Enric Miralles.

Benedetta Tagliabue becomes the current ninth member of the jury of The Pritzker Architecture Prize, joining: Lord Peter Palumbo (chair), Alejandro Aravena, Stephen Breyer, Yung Ho Chang, Kristin Feireiss, Glenn Murcutt, Juhani Pallasmaa and Ratan N. Tata. The executive director is Martha Thorne.

Jury members serve for multiple years to assure a balance between current and new members and are entrusted with selecting the laureate each year. No outside observers or members of the Pritzker family are present during jury deliberations and voting. The international jury members are recognized professionals in their own fields of architecture, business, education, publishing, and culture.  

The Pritzker Architecture Prize honors a living architect or architects whose built work demonstrates a combination of those qualities of talent, vision, and commitment, which has produced consistent and significant contributions to humanity and the built environment through the art of architecture.

The Pritzker family of Chicago established the international prize through their Hyatt Foundation in 1979. The Hyatt Foundation sponsors the prize which is granted annually. It is often referred to as “architecture’s highest honor.” The award consists of US $100,000 and a bronze medallion, conferred on the laureate at a ceremony held each year at a different site throughout the world.

The 2015 Pritzker Architecture Prize Laureate is scheduled to be announced in March 2015.

> via pritzkerprize.com