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NEW YORK, NY, February 17, 2016 — The American Institute of Architects New York Chapter (AIANY) will confer its highest annual awards and toast the winners of the 2016 AIANY Design Awards at the Honors and Awards Luncheon at Cipriani Wall Street, 55 Wall Street, on Friday, April 15, 2016.

Every year, AIANY honors architects, philanthropists, public servants, and organizations that are committed to improving communities through design excellence. The Chapter’s annual Honors and Design Awards reinforce AIA’s central principle: design matters. In 2016, the AIANY Medal of Honor will be awarded to Anabelle Selldorf, FAIA, of Selldorf Architects; the Award of Merit will be conferred to Robert M. Rubin; and acclaimed photographer Iwan Baan will be honored with the Stephen A. Kliment Oculus Award. The Chapter will also fete the winners of the AIANY Design Awards, who will be announced on February 29, 2016.

The recipients were selected by the AIANY 2016 Honors Committee, chaired by AIANY 2016 President Carol Loewenson, FAIA. 2016 committee members include Heidi Blau, FAIA, FXFOWLE Architects; Vincent Chang, AIA, Grimshaw Architects; Risa Honig, AIA, CUNY Department of Design, Construction, and Management; Gordon Kipping, AIA, G Tects; Jonathan J. Marvel, FAIA, Marvel Architects; and Kim Yao, AIA, Architecture Research Office.

“AIANY’s annual Honors and Awards Luncheon recognizes a range of leaders who enrich the field of architecture. We are confident that the exemplary work of each of the 2016 honorees greatly enhances our understanding and enjoyment of the built environment,” said Benjamin Prosky, Executive Director of AIANY and the Center for Architecture.

ABOUT THE HONOREES

Medal of Honor
Annabelle Selldorf, FAIA, Principal, Selldorf Architects

“It will be my great pleasure to present the Medal of Honor to Annabelle Selldorf, FAIA,” said Carol Loewenson, FAIA. “Fearless in the commissions she pursues, Selldorf has designed extraordinary buildings that range from galleries and libraries to a material recovery facility.”

Annabelle Selldorf is Principal of Selldorf Architects, a 65-person architectural design practice founded in New York City in 1988. The firm has worked on public and private projects at scales encompassing large new construction, historic renovations, and exhibition design. Selldorf Architects’ clients include cultural institutions and universities such as Neue Galerie New York, Sterling and Francine Clark Art Institute, and Brown University. In addition, the firm has created galleries for Hauser & Wirth and Gladstone Gallery, among others, and designed exhibitions for Frieze Masters and the 2013 Venice Art Biennale.

Selldorf Architects recently completed a 30,000-square-foot LEED Gold gallery building for David Zwirner and finished work on the Sunset Park Material Recovery Facility, a new recycling facility and education center on the Brooklyn waterfront. Selldorf Architects is currently designing an expansion for the Museum of Contemporary Art San Diego and converting a former rail depot into LUMA Arles, a contemporary art center in Arles, France. The firm is also renovating a 17,500-square-foot space in Midtown Manhattan for Steinway & Sons.

Selldorf is a Fellow of the American Institute of Architects and a Board Member of the Architectural League of New York and the Chinati Foundation. In 2014, she was the recipient of the American Academy of Arts and Letters’ prestigious Award in Architecture. Born and raised in Germany, she received a Bachelor of Architecture degree from Pratt Institute and a Master of Architecture degree from Syracuse University in Florence, Italy. Selldorf Architects’ new monograph, published by Phaidon, will be out in the spring of 2016.

About the Medal of Honor
The Medal of Honor is the highest honor for distinction in the profession, conferred to an architect or a firm of architects for distinguished work and a high professional standing. Any AIA architect member practicing in the territory of the Chapter is eligible for this award. Past recipients include Ludwig Mies van der Rohe (1947), Marcel Breuer (1965), Louis Kahn (1970), Richard Meier (1980), Tod Williams Billie Tsien Architects (1996), Weiss/Manfredi (2007), Diller Scofidio + Renfro (2009), and Denise Scott Brown, RIBA, Int. FRIBA, and Robert Venturi, FAIA, Int. FRIBA (2014).

Award of Merit
Robert Rubin

“Robert Rubin has made a tremendous contribution as a connoisseur to the preservation of some of the most idiosyncratic and unique works in architecture. Perhaps best known for his work on the Maison de Verre in Paris, Rubin has preserved and brought to the public eye works by Jean Prouve, Shigeru Ban, and Buckminster Fuller. Rubin is a true renaissance man: an impressive intellectual, informed patron, and generous philanthropist,” remarked Carol Loewenson, FAIA.

Robert Rubin began his adult life as a commodity and currency trader. During his 25 years on Wall Street, he served on the New York Federal Reserve’s Foreign Exchange Committee, as well as on President Clinton’s Commission on Capital Budgeting.

At the turn of the millennium, he cashed in his chips and enrolled in the Theory and History of Architecture PhD program at Columbia University, where he’s ABD. He writes on such diverse subjects as Alexander Calder and Rayner Banham and curates exhibitions on art, architecture, and cinema. He co-authored, with Olivier Cinqualbre of the Centre Pompidou, Jean Prouvé: Tropical House. Most recently, he curated Walkers: Hollywood Afterlives in Art and Artifact, currently on view at the Museum of the Moving Image. He has also contributed an essay on Pierre Chareau’s time in America to the catalog for the upcoming exhibition on Chareau at the Jewish Museum. He and his wife Stéphane donated the Tropical House to the Centre Pompidou in 2002. In 2005, they acquired Chareau’s Maison de Verre in Paris, which they open on a regular basis to architects and architecture schools. Rubin also restored the largest of Buckminster Fuller’s three Fly’s Eye Dome prototypes. His next exhibition, Richard Avedon’s France: Old World, New Look, opens in Paris in fall 2016.

As a patron of new architecture, Rubin, with architect Roger Ferris, built a golf clubhouse on Long Island that stood the conservative typology on its ear with its openness and informality. That building has had a widespread influence in the golf industry. With architect Gordon Kipping, he recently completed a golf learning center with state-of-the-art simulators in a community space in Harlem, where at-risk youth go for academic tutoring and golf instruction.

About the Award of Merit
The Award of Merit is conferred to a non-professional for contributions as a client, public servant, critic, or layperson in any appropriate field related to the profession. Past recipients include Richard Buckminster Fuller (1952), Lewis Mumford (1962), David Rockefeller (1965), Jane Jacobs (1980), Phyllis Lambert (1991), Design Trust for Public Space (2001), former DOT Commissioner Janette Sadik-Khan (2008), and Alexander Garvin (2012).

Stephen A. Kliment Oculus Award
Iwan Baan, Photographer

“Sometimes the only way we know buildings that are in far off lands is from photographs,” said Carol Loewenson, FAIA. “Iwan Baan’s pictures bring to life not only the spaces and forms, but the qualities of life in the buildings he shoots. And he is fearless in getting the perfect shot. We all remember the New York Magazine cover taken the night of Sandy.”

After his studies in photography at the Royal Academy of Arts in The Hague, Iwan Baan followed his interest in documentary photography before narrowing his focus to record the various ways in which individuals, communities, and societies create and interact with their built environment.

With his combined passion for documentary and space, Baan’s photographs reveal our innate ability to re-appropriate objects and materials to find places we can call our own. This can be seen in his work on informal communities where vernacular architecture and placemaking serve as examples of human ingenuity, such as his images of the Torre David in Caracas, a series that won Baan the Golden Lion for Best Installation at the 2012 Venice Architecture Biennale.

With no formal training in architecture, his perspective mirrors that of everyday individuals who give meaning and context to the architecture and spaces that surround us. This artistic approach gives architecture an approachable and accessible voice.

As the inaugural recipient of the Julius Shulman Award for Photography, today, architects such as Rem Koolhaas, Herzog & de Meuron, Zaha Hadid, Diller Scofidio + Renfro, Toyo Ito, SANAA, and Morphosis turn to Baan to give their work a sense of place and narrative. Alongside his architecture commissions, Baan has collaborated on several successful book projects such as Insular Insight: Where Art and Architecture Conspire with Nature, Torre David: Informal Vertical Communities, and Brasilia & Chandigarh – Living With Modernity. Baan’s work also appears on the pages of architecture, design and lifestyle publications such as The Wall Street Journal, The New York Times, Domus, Abitare, and Architectural Digest.

About the Stephen A. Kliment Oculus Award
The Stephen A. Kliment Oculus Award is conferred to honor a person’s influence on the practice of architecture and on helping those in the profession by promoting and elevating its standards. The award is named after Kliment for his long-lasting contributions to multiple publications, including Architectural Record and the Chapter’s own Oculus magazine. Former recipients include Ezra Stoller, ESTO (2005); Diana Darling and William Menking, The Architect’s Newspaper (2007); Fred Bernstein (2008); Ada Louise Huxtable (2009); Paul Goldberger (2012); Suzanne Stephens (2013); Susan S. Szenasy, Metropolis (2014); and Justin Davidson, New York Magazine (2015).

2016 AIANY DESIGN AWARDS

The winners of the AIANY Design Awards represent exceptional work by AIA New York Chapter members and other architects practicing in New York in four categories: architecture, interiors, projects, and urban design. Winning projects, granted either “honor” or “merit” awards, are chosen for exemplary originality and quality. Jurors also select an annual “Best in Competition” selection from all four categories. In selecting the winners, jurors consider design quality, program resolution, innovation, thoughtfulness, and technique. Winners will be announced on the evening of February 29, 2016 at the Center for Architecture.

About the AIA New York Chapter
AIA New York is the oldest and largest chapter of the American Institute of Architects with more than 5,500 architect, allied professional, student, and public members. AIANY is dedicated to three goals: design excellence, public outreach and professional development. www.aiany.org