Venice Architecture Biennale 2012

Theme:

Common Ground is the theme of the 13th edition of the international architecture exhibition being held in Venice from August 29 to November 25 at the Giardini della Biennale and the Arsenale.

The exhibition, coordinated by architect David Chipperfield, brings together 69 projects by architects, photographers, artists, etc. who share a common affinity with the theme. This year's 119 participants respond to the identity crisis that architects are going through in an attempt to bridge the resulting fracture between architecture and civil society.

In the thematic description of the exhibition, David Chipperfield emphasized the need for architects to react against the prevailing, directed, professional and cultural tendencies dictated by contemporary society that deliberately emphasize isolated individual actions at the expense of contextualizing the architectural object.

The vision proposed at the Biennale advocated demonstrating the importance of the influences and continuity of cultural trends through the ability to capture and prevail the ideas that form the basis of an 'architectural culture'. The importance of a building, Chipperfield points out, does not lie in the individual spectacle of the architectural object, but is a manifestation of cultural values that belong to the community. The built world by which we are surrounded is the specific computer code that transposes the determining elements of a continuous evolution of architectural language and criticism related to the understanding of the environment. The theme of the Biennale emphasizes issues of continuity, context and memory in relation to the built environment and the relationships established at an individual level with it. The personalized perception of the collective message complements the bigger picture by attempting to blur the apparent lack of understanding between profession and society.

| Ireland

| United States

| Japan

| Poland

| Australia

| Germany

| Uruguay

| Canada

| Czech Republic

| Russian Federation

| Nordic Countries

| Switzerland

| Serbia

Photos: © Alexandru Crișan, 2012

Awards:

[Golden Lion category]

Japan Pavilion (Commissioner Toyo Ito), organized around the theme Architecture possible here? Home-for-All (Naoya Hatakeyama, Kumiko Inui, Sou Fujimoto, Akihisa Hirata), was the one that managed to capture the spirit of the proposed theme(Common Ground) through its practical responsiveness and creativity in design, highlighted in the way it reorganized the center of a region subject to national disaster. It was awarded the Biennale prize(Golden Lion, No. 1 in the national participation category). Urban-Think Tank (Alfredo Brillembourg, Hubert Klumpner) together with Justin McGuirk at the Arsenale receive the Biennale prize in the category architectural project in the exhibition(Golden Lion, no. 2) with the theme Torre David / Gran Horizonte for the integration of a new community in an abandoned building. The Biennale's Lifetime Achievement Award(Golden Lion, No. 3), nominated by David Chipperfield, goes to architect Alvaro Siza Vieira.

[Silver Lion category]

The Silver Lion award goes to Grafton Architects (Yvonne Farrell, Shelley McNamara) for the Irish pavilion, Shifting Grounds. Similar responses were given to the special mentions awarded to the Polish, US(Spontaneous Interventions), Russian(i-city) pavilions and Cino Zucchi's installation at the Arsenale, Copycat, which evokes the complex web of relationships that influence the environment.