This is a brief introduction
to the Pritzker Architecture Prize. This
same video clip is provided in a kiosk in the traveling exhibition The
Art of Architecture.
The
1999 Award Ceremony in Berlin
The White House 20th Anniversary
Ceremony of the Pritzker Prize
The program begins with a welcome
by the First Lady, followed by remarks from J. Carter Brown, the Pritzker
Jury Chairman, who in turn introduces Vincent Scully, Sterling Professor
emeritus of the History of Art at Yale University. The program continues
with Mrs. Clinton introducing Jay A. Pritzker, president of The Hyatt Foundation
who then makes the presentation of the prize to Renzo Piano. Renzo Piano
then accepts the prize. The program closes with President Clinton.
News
Coverage from
Ovation
Arts Network –
Pritzker
Prize White House Ceremony
Time: 4:42
This is the news coverage aired on
Ovation Arts Network of the 20th anniversary ceremony of the
Pritzker Architecture Prize held at the White House and hosted by President
and Mrs. Clinton on June 17, 1998.
The
Getty Center Ceremony in 1996
Time – 21:46
In 1996, the location for the Pritzker
Prize award ceremony was in the tradition of previous awards over the previous
18 years, traditional in the sense that sites of architectural significance
around the world have been chosen to pay homage to architects of earlier
eras, or in some cases, works by previous laureates of the Pritzker Prize.
The latter was true in this case since
Richard Meier, the 1984 Pritzker Laureate, is the architect of The Getty
Center in Los Angeles, California.
Never before had the ceremony been
held in a construction site, which it was at this time.
Architecture and the City, Friends or Foes?
Part
1 Time – 29:32
Part
2 Time – 28:00
The Tenth Anniversary of the Pritzker
Architecture Prize was celebrated in Chicago with a ceremony at The Art
Institute and a televised symposium produced by WTTW/Chicago and DeeGee
Productions. The program aired on many PBS stations, numerous independent
channels, and The Learning Channel.
"Architecture has long been considered
the mother of all the arts," is how the distinguished journalist Edwin
Newman, serving as moderator, opened the television symposium, Architecture
and the City: Friends or Foes? "Building and decorating shelter was one
of the first expressions of man's creativity, but we take for granted most
of the places in which we work or live," he continued. "Architecture has
become both the least and the most conspicuous of art forms."
With a panel that included three architects,
a critic, a city planner, a developer, a mayor, a lawyer, a museum director,
an industrialist, an educator, an administrator, the symposium explored
problems facing everyone - not just those who live in big cities, but anyone
involved in community life. Some of the questions discussed: what should
be built, how much, where, when, what will it look like, what controls
should be allowed, and who should impose them?
J. Irwin Miller, already mentioned
as a founding juror, was praised by fellow panelists and credited with
making his hometown of Columbus, Indiana "an architectural museum." He
pointed to the inner cities of this country and Europe as the "real scandal
of western civilization." He called for governments, developers and architects
to look at their projects through the eyes of the people who will live
there.
Prominent Chicago architect Stanley
Tigerman pointed out that many of the topics discussed cannot be addressed
directly by architects because there are larger issues involved: cultural,
political and ideological, particularly as related to the problems of the
elderly and the homeless.
The other panelists included J. Carter
Brown and Bill Lacy; Robert Campbell, architecture critic of the Boston
Globe; Juanita Crabb, mayor of Binghampton, New York; Jaquelin Robertson,
dean of the school of architecture, University of Virginia; Robert Gladstone,
a prominent developer from Washington, D.C.; two other architects, Frank
Gehry from Los Angeles and Hugh Hardy from New York; the late Julian Levi,
professor of law, Hastings College, San Francisco; and Dean Macris, San
Francisco city planning director.
According to Lacy, "The majority of
Americans spend most of their lives in urban areas, yet few understand
the forces that create our cities. This is an effort to focus attention
on the factors of growth, habitability, esthetics and economics of the
places we live, whether big city or small town, from one end of the country
to the other.
As the fast hour drew to a close, Edwin
Newman summarized, "Architects are certainly not the foes of the city,
but perhaps they have not been friendly enough."
