Swiss Architectural Award 2022 , Mendrisio/ Schweiz

Press release by the Fondazione Teatro dell’architettura Mendrisio

SWISS ARCHITECTURAL AWARD 2022

Thursday, May 4, 2023, 7 p.m.
Auditorium Teatro dell’architettura Mendrisio

Award ceremony of the winner Xu Tiantian, founder of DnA Design and Architecture (China)
Swiss Architectural Award 2022 promoted by the Fondazione Teatro dell’architettura

and

Opening of the Swiss Architectural Award 2022 exhibition
promoted by the Academy of Architecture of Università della Svizzera italiana
from May 5 to October 22, 2023

The Teatro dell'architettura Mendrisio of the Università della Svizzera italiana, is pleased to announce that on May 4, 2023 the renowned Swiss Architectural Award 2022 – promoted by the Fondazione Teatro dell’architettura – will be conferred to the winner Xu Tiantian, founder of DnA Design and Architecture (China).

On the same eve the Swiss Architectural Award 2022 exhibition - promoted by the Academy of Architecture, Università della Svizzera italiana - will open his doors to the public, from May 5 to October 22, 2023 at the Auditorium of Teatro dell’architettura Mendrisio.

As part of the event, Xu Tiantian, the winner of the Swiss Architectural Award 2022, will hold a public lecture on her work and on the context in which she operates.

The jury of the eighth edition of the Swiss Architectural Award - chaired by Mario Botta and composed of Walter Angonese (Director of the Accademia di architettura, USI), Stéphanie Bru (winner, with the Paris-based studio Bruther, of the seventh SAA edition), Dieter Dietz (Director of the Section d’Architecture, EPFL-ENAC) and Tom Emerson (Dean of the Departement Architektur, ETHZ) - unanimously conferred the Swiss Architectural Award 2022 to Xu Tiantian for the reuse of the Shimen Bridge over the Songyin River (2016-2017), the tofu factory in Caizhai Village (2017-2018), and the reuse of the Jinyun quarries (2021- 2022).

The works presented by Xu Tiantian, were described by the architect as acupuncture interventions that aim to revitalize historic settlements or pieces of landscape. These projects, located in both Songyang and Jinyun counties (a rural area in Zhejang province (China) characterised by a landscape whose traditional structure has been preserved on the one hand, and on the other threatened by the depopulation process induced by the migration of younger people to the region’s urban centres), convinced the jury for the successful combination between the civic instances animating them (as they aim to serve local communities) and the quality of the proposed architecture, characterised by a marked attention to the context, by a precise and poetic attitude at the same time, and by the blending of different scales and themes, between architecture and infrastructure, between permanent and ephemeral, between reuse and ex-novo intervention.

THE AWARD
Promoted by the Fondazione Teatro dell’architettura, confirms the collaboration between the three Swiss Schools of Architecture USI – Accademia di architettura, Mendrisio; EPFL – ENAC, Section d’Architecture, Lausanne; ETHZ – Departement Architektur, Zurich, represented in the jury, chaired by architect Mario Botta, by their deans/directors, Walter Angonese, Dieter Dietz and Tom Emerson. The Award benefits from the organizational and operative support of the Università della Svizzera italiana - Academy of Architecture.

With this cooperation, which reaffirms the Award’s national importance, the Swiss Architectural Award confirms it is one of the best endowed and most prestigious architectural awards, by virtue of an advisory committee consisting of internationally renowned architects and architecture critics. The Swiss Architectural Award aims to promote a kind of architecture that is sensitive to contemporary ethical, aesthetic and ecological issues and can facilitate public and disciplinary debate. The prize is awarded, on a biennial basis, to architects not older than 50 years (in the year in which the Award is launched), without distinction of nationality, who have completed at least three significant works.

THE WINNER
Xu Tiantian (Fujian, 1975) gained a Bachelor’s degree from Tsinghua University of Beijing and a Master of Architecture in Urban Design from the Harvard University Graduate School of Design. After working in the United States and the Netherlands for OMA, she founded the studio DnA_Design and Architecture in Beijing. In 2006, she received the WA China Architecture Award and in 2008 the Young Architects Award from The Architectural League New York. In 2019 she was awarded the Moira Gemmill Prize for Emerging Architecture. In March 2018, an exhibition about her work, Rural Moves – The Songyang Story, opened at AEDES Architecture Forum in Berlin.

THE EXHIBITION
At the Auditorium of the Teatro dell’architettura Mendrisio, the exhibition of the projects selected for the eighth edition of the Award will be on display from May 4, 2023 to October 22, 2023, curated by Marco Della Torre and Stefania Murer. The exhibition shows the works of the 26 candidates from 14 different countries, with a special focus to the winner.

The candidates in the 2022 edition of the Swiss Architectural Award were: Atelier Masōmī - Mariam Kamara (Niger), Bernardo Bader (Austria), Barão Hutter (Ivo Mendes Barão Teixeira, Peter Hutter, Switzerland), Giulio Basili (Italy), Bloco Arquitetos (Daniel Mangabeira, Henrique Coutinho, Matheus Seco, Brazil), Manuel Cervantes (Mexico), dekleva gregoric architects (Aljoša Dekleva, Tina Gregorič, Slovenia); Domat (Maggie Ma, Mark Kingsley, China); Estudio Flume (Christian Teshirogi, Noelia Montero, Brazil), Estudio Macías Peredo (Magui Peredo, Salvador Macías, Messico), Graux & Baeyens (Basile Graux, Koen Baeyens, Belgium), Grillovasiu (Romina Grillo, Liviu Vasiu, Switzerland), Go Hasegawa (Japan), Carla Juaçaba (Brazil), Ryan Kennihan (Ireland), LACOL Arquitectura Cooperativa (Spain), lopes brenna (Cristiana Lopes, Giacomo Brenna, Switzerland), Rozana Montiel (Mexico), Nickisch Walder Architekten (Georg Nickisch, Selina Walder, Switzerland), RAMA estudio (Carla Chávez, Felipe Donoso, Carolina Rodas, Ecuador), sugiberri (Mayu Takasugi, Johannes Berry, Belgium), TEd’A Arquitectes (Irene Perez Piferrer, Jaume Mayol Amengual, Spain); Terra+Tuma (Danilo Terra, Fernanda Sakano, Pedro Tuma, Juliana Terra, Brazil), Tropical Space (Tran Thi Ngu Ngon, Nguyen Hai Long, Vietnam), Xu Tiantian – DnA Design and Architecture (China), Raphael Zuber (Switzerland).

THE CATALOG
The catalog of the exhibition, in Italian and English, is published by Mendrisio Academy Press and Silvana Editoriale and edited by Nicola Navone.

For all the information on all the editions of the Award, please refer to www.swissarchitecturalaward.com.

THE FONDAZIONE TEATRO DELL’ARCHITETTURA
The Foundation, based in Mendrisio and chaired by Mario Botta, aims, in particular, to offer visibility to the new transdisciplinary interests that increasingly intervene in the design process and redefine the social role of architecture. The complex issues facing contemporary society - commitment to the environment, the availability of energy resources, drastic climate change and new complex social realities - strongly condition the dynamics linked to identity aspects at a territorial level, so much so that new approaches and a new disciplinary sensitivity are needed in the field of architecture, urban studies and landscape design.

TEATRO DELL’ARCHITETTURA MENDRISIO
The Teatro dell’architettura Mendrisio, which stands on the Campus in Mendrisio - Università della Svizzera italiana, is a multi-functional space of dialogue devoted to the cultural debate on architecture, the city and the landscape. Together with the teaching and research conducted by the university, the work of the Teatro d’architettura Mendrisio supplements its educational offerings with exhibitions, performances, seminars and lectures, showcasing the transdisciplinary interests, between memory and the contemporary, active in the design processes and the redefinition of the role of architecture in society. In 2020 the Teatro dell’architettura Mendrisio, together with the Vincenzo Vela Museum in Ligornetto, the Pinacoteca Giovanni Züst in Rancate, the m.a.x. museum in Chiasso and the Museo d’arte Mendrisio, have activated the Network Musei d’Arte del Mendrisiotto (Rete MAM). Since 2022, the Teatro dell’architettura Mendrisio has been a member of the Swiss Museums Association - AMS. With nearly 800 institutions, the Swiss Museums Association represents the full diversity of the Swiss museum landscape, particularly in the eyes of the authorities and the general public.

INFORMATION
“Swiss Architectural Award 2022”
May 5 - October 22, 2023

Exhibition promoted by the Academy of Architecture- USI, in partnership with the Fondazione Teatro dell’architettura.

Teatro dell’architettura Mendrisio
Via Turconi 25
6850 Mendrisio, Switzerland

Press preview: Thursday May 4, 2023, 11 a.m.
Exhibition opening: Thursday May 4, 2023, 7 p.m.

Calendar and opening hours:
Exhibition “Swiss Architectural Award 2022”
May 5 - October 22, 2023

Tuesday / Wednesday / Thursday / Friday: 2–6pm
Saturday / Sunday: 10am–6pm
Mondays closed
Special openings
Thursday May 18, 2023. Ascension, 2 to 6 pm.
Thursday June 8, 2023, Corpus Christi, from 2 to 6 pm.
Thursday June 29, 2023, St. Peter and Paul, 2 to 6 pm.

Summer closure: July 17 to August 21, 2023
TAM will be closed on April 10, May 1, May 29, 2023
More information on special openings and closures: www.tam.usi.ch

Free admission