¿Anyway Architecture,? Mies 2013

Le Fresnoy project, admiration and irritation caused alike, even someone heralded the end of the architecture with such postulates. In that context we were with Le Fresnoy's ideas.

Currently, far from those theoretical discourse, the debate seems to be on the same station after the jury's verdict of Mies van der Rohe Award 2013, won by architects, Henning Larsen Architects, Batteríið Architects and Studio Olafur Eliasson, with Reykjavik Concert Hall and Conference Centre in Iceland, and having been the 'Emerging Architect Special Mention' award to María Langarita and Víctor Navarro for the Nave de Música Matadero (Red Bull Music Academy) in Madrid, Spain.

The result is not surprising, knowing the questionable selection of finalist projects and jury components, and also not surprising that the members of the jury were unable to escape the notorious involvement of an not-architect and the value of his great contribution in the winning project.

The Auditorium Harpa is a project with a program well resolved in all its aspects and brilliantly executed, however is this enough to be awarded the Mies van der Rohe? probably not, there are many good projects, something else is what makes a project stand out over others and that something else in this case is certainly exceptional is its facade, designed by artist Olafur Eliasson.

A few months ago we presented the project, now awarded, in an article entitled "When the Guest is better than the Author. Olafur Eliasson." Not the first time this Icelandic artist has collaborated with architects or involved in architectural projects, one such occasion was Olafur involvement with architect Kjetil Thorse, in 2007, with the Serpentine Gallery pavilion, at London.

Collaborations between architecture and art, between architects and artists, are very common, however what happens when the work  by the Guest is better than work by the Author?, Who really has been awarded Mies van der Rohe Award 2013, the artist or the architects?

The 'Emerging Architect Special Mention' award to María Langarita and Víctor Navarro, without forgetting the brilliance of their project, again place us in a similar position. The project, of course, is a good project, is the result of intervening on an existing building, the nave 15 Matadero, with a project that not anyone is slipping, is more scenographic than architectural, organizing a program, a distribution of interior space, conceptually like the programs for employees in google headquarters, in this case,  (the Nave de Música Matadero) is the same for those who use the facilities under the sponsorship of Red Bull.

Interior architectures, ephemeral architecture, programmatic architectures, scenographic architecture, decorated architectures, architectures, without any doubt, however, if we questioned the Spanish intervention in the Venice Biennale for his detachment from reality, we are convinced that the results by Mies van der Rohe Award are bright reflections of an exhausted period, are Anyways.

* "Any Congresses" organized by Peter Eisenman, was held in different cities accompanied by a second particle, that defined part of the contents of the proposed discussion to participants. In 1993 Barcelona was "way" resulting "Anyway".

The jury members who selected the finalists for 2013 are: Wiel Arets, Chair of the Jury, Principal, Wiel Arets Architects, Maastricht/Dean, College of Architecture, IIT, Chicago; Pedro Gadanho, Curator, Contemporary Architecture, Museum of Modern Art (MoMA), New York; Antón García-Abril, Principal, Ensamble Studio; Louisa Hutton, Principal, Sauerbruch Hutton Architects, Berlin; Kent Martinussen, CEO, The Danske Arkitekter Center (DAC), Copenhagen; Frédéric Migayrou, Director, Architecture & Design, Centre Pompidou, Paris; Ewa Porebska, Editor-in-Chief, Architektura-murator, Warsaw; Giovanna Carnevali, Secretary of the Jury, Director, Fundació Mies van der Rohe, Barcelona.