Believe it or not, until last year the first World Architecture Festival, sponsored and sponsored by two leading architecture magazines, Architectural Review and Architectural Record, had never seen such an event. Of course, there are many competitions and awards that determine the best building or architect of the year, but they are either closed, when the nominees are nominated by the organizing committee itself and it also determines the winner, or selective, when projects are nominated by geography (regional or national review contests) and typological characteristics, as well as the fact of the use of this or that material. For a long time, no one undertook to bring together projects from all over the world into a single competitive program, until an initiative group led by Paul Finch, editor-in-chief of Architectural Review, dared to bring this idea, unprecedented in scope and ambition, to life.
The principle of the competition is quite simple. Any architect from any country can participate in it and apply for the title of "The Best Building in the World". To do this, you need to send an application with presentation materials of your object and pay the competition fee (545 euros). All submitted applications undergo a preliminary selection (!), On the basis of which a short-list of each of the nominations is formed (one nomination is one typology, but each typology, in turn, was divided into projects, buildings under construction and already constructed, so that in general difficulties at the festival were presented objects in 42 categories). At the same time, having learned from the experience of the past year, the organizers have repeatedly called on potential participants in the competition to take a responsible approach to the selection and design of the materials sent. In particular, the official website of WAF contains requirements for competitive entries: in order for a building to be shortlisted and be able to claim victory, it must not only correspond to the famous Vitruvian triad, but also have fifteen qualities, including stability, scale, contextuality, expressiveness of the architectural language, etc.
The next competitive stage is the most spectacular and unusual. During the festival, the authors of the shortlisted projects present them to the jury. These presentations are open to the public, everyone can freely come and get acquainted in detail with the author's concept inherent in the architecture, as well as ask the author a question. The presentation marathon lasts two days, during which the section jury selects the winners in their nomination. On the third day, presentations of the winners from all sections take place and, finally, one building is selected from among them, which is awarded the title "Best Building in the World".
There is no doubt that the competitive procedure is built extremely perspicaciously, virtually excluding any possibility of accusing the organizers of bias or rigging the results. And in this regard, the organizers must be given their due. Architectural competitions, especially building competitions, are very difficult business, and their results rarely reflect the objective state of affairs and the real quality of architecture. However, at WAF everything is organized so that no political and subjective considerations and personal relationships would distort the final picture and sow doubts about the purity of the competition results in the world architectural community. For a newly created and ambitious global festival, this is the fundamental guarantee of success.
Of course, when 15 buildings of approximately the same level compete in each section, and 5 of them were designed by architectural stars and have already been published many times in the professional press, it is difficult for the jury members to maintain impartiality. A certain vectorization of the selection is inevitable, in which two or three are selected as the most important qualities of the nominee projects. For example, this year, taking into account the crisis and general concern for the environment, such criteria were efficiency, sustainability (in all the diversity of the concept of "sustainability") and everyone's favorite innovation (though not technological, but rather intellectual). These unspoken guidelines, supported by the ideologically oriented special project "Less Does More", which was prepared by the organizers of the festival and became a kind of motto for the entire event, determined the choice of winners in most sections. As a result, they influenced the decision of the final jury, which recognized the cultural center from South Africa (Mapungubwe Interpretation Center) by Peter Rich Architects as the "Best Building in the World". Such, at first glance, an extravagant and somewhat curious decision could compromise the festival, if not for one "but": all projects that reached the final were executed at the highest level. In some buildings the quality of architecture comes from its artistry, in some - from the perfection of technology, in some - from the originality of the idea, but any of them has every right to be called "the best". And this year, the architects who took part in the Barcelona Festival as contestants, jury members and visitors, found it necessary to present to the world just such a hypostasis of modern architectural thought, devoid of pretentiousness, not burdened by gigantic investments, extremely organic and honest.
The Architectural News Agency asked several Russian participants to share their impressions of the 2009 Barcelona World Architecture Festival.
Vladimir Plotkin
Architect, chief architect of TPO "Reserve", participant of the WAF 2008 competition program in the sections "Public building", "Trade", "Private house", member of the WAF jury 2008, 2009
This year I was at WAF for the second time. In 2008, I took part in the competition and was a member of the jury in the "Production" section, in a word, I visited both sides of the barricades. This year I was just a jury, but I got one of the most interesting and rich nominations - "Culture", it featured the most projects (17 nominees), and the competition was quite serious. In addition, I participated in the judging of the student competition.
Unfortunately, I must say that the first and second festivals are very different from each other, and not in favor of the latter. In 2008, I was amazed at how it was organized, how stellar the composition of participants and speakers was, the level of projects, an interesting atmosphere, and opportunities for live communication. I think that such a strong impression was also explained by the fact that it started soon after the opening of the Venice Biennale and was radically different from it. After the glamorous celebration of life in Venice, beautiful, but absolutely unarchitectural, the Barcelona Festival was associated rather with our "Architecture", only with an amendment to the modern level and international scale of the event.
This year, the competition program included not only buildings, but also projects. The level of work has become much more modest, which is not surprising. It is extremely difficult to find 500-700 buildings of the highest level every year, even if you are not limited by geography. However, it cannot be said that the "architectural stars" this year bypassed the festival with their attention. After all, it is organized under the auspices of two of the world's leading architectural magazines: the English Architectural Review and the American Architectural Record; publication in which is prestigious for all architects, without exception. Only in the Culture section were projects presented by such architects as Eric Miralles and Benedetta Tagliabue, Nicholas Grimshaw and Norman Foster. In addition, there were wonderful projects from Korea, Singapore and Austria. This I list only those works that I noted for myself. In general, out of 17 nominated projects, 12 were at an excellent level. Most of all I liked the Grimshaw project. Great work, very rich, extremely inventive, well thought out. But my colleagues on the jury did not support me at all, arguing their decision by the fact that "with such a budget, any fool can build so many tricks." So they weren't interested in this building. But the South African project Mapungubwe Interpretation Center fell in love with, more precisely, in the mind, since the choice of the winner was dictated not so much by emotions as by the analysis of the situation and following the current trend of “sustainability”.
Sergey Skuratov
Architect, head of the bureau "Sergey Skuratov Architects", participant of the WAF 2009 competition program in the sections "Multifunctional Housing", "Offices"
The festival left a mixed impression. After the success of last year's WAF, everyone expected a lot from it this year as well. But this did not happen and, it seems to me, for quite natural reasons. The first event is always brighter, more ambitious, because it contains the most interesting works created in all previous years. And the subsequent activities are awarded, on a leftover basis, either recently completed buildings, or objects that, for some reason, were not shown last time.
The crisis also undoubtedly played its negative role. There were fewer participants, fewer visitors. In 2008, there were significantly more first-class stars among the participants of the competition and architects who gave lectures. This year, there were big names among the invitees and contestants, but, basically, a very good, highly professional middle class was exhibited in the competition program, making high-quality modern architecture, but at the same time somehow subtly identical.
Against this background, Russian projects looked very good. Some even had a chance of winning. For example, after the end of the competition, the chairman of the jury in the "Offices" nomination, where I exhibited "Danilovsky Fort", said that this project was among the top three. It turned out that he had seen my building in Moscow, and it made a great impression on him.
I have no doubt that in terms of the quality of architecture, our projects were up to par. But a number of circumstances did not allow us to achieve victory. In my case, first of all, my imperfect English played a negative role. In conditions when you have only 10 minutes to convey the essence of the project to the jury members, the liveliness of information transfer is very important, artistry, if you will. When I defend a project in Russian, I can joke, and say something with conviction, focus attention. But in the presentation in English, I couldn't do it. The effect of the performance was not the same.
On the other hand, it was unexpected for me the attention that the jury members showed to the fate of the already constructed building. How does it function, how do tenants settle down, how does it develop? It's okay for them. Most of the contestants showed office buildings not only from the outside, but also from the inside, along with interiors, the design of which continued the themes started in architecture. And the Danilovsky Fort, which has just been commissioned, has neither tenants nor interiors yet. Its destiny is just beginning to take shape … As a result, the Unileverhaus, designed by Behnisch Architekten, won in the "Offices" section. This is undoubtedly a worthy project, but I cannot say that this is an outstanding architecture. Apparently, the victory was brought to him by the fact that it implements all the fundamental qualities for today's architectural establishment: innovativeness, environmental friendliness, great social resonance, and efficiency.
Andrey Asadov
Architect, head of the A. Asadov Workshop, participant of the WAF 2009 competition program in the sections "Interior", "Reconstruction", "Conceptual Design"
After numerous enthusiastic responses from colleagues who traveled to the first WAF 2008 festival, we decided to take part in it and show two of our buildings (the reconstructed CAP building and the interior of the new GITIS theater), as well as conceptual projects from the "Islands" series.
We made such a decision, rather, for reasons of self-development (to see others, to show ourselves), than from any strategic calculations. Participation in such competitions has no practical benefit, especially since the winner receives only a title (recognition and honor), and not a cash prize. And the Russian architect cannot find customers there for sure. To some extent, this festival is really similar to Zodchestvo and Golden Section, only on a global scale. Until recently, every self-respecting architect considered himself obligated to take part in these reviews. Now we have the opportunity to attend international festivals, and it seems to me that this can be extremely useful and interesting for Russian architects. But there is one fundamental point here - fluency in English, the absence of which severely limits us in terms of project presentation, acquaintances, and professional communication at the festival itself.
In addition, you should think very carefully about the presentation of your project. The usual approach for us is not suitable here. First of all, you shouldn't strive to include as much material as possible in one presentation. It is in this, as it seems to me, that we were mistaken, presenting the series of projects "Ostrov" and including all the variants made in it. This could not fail to disorient the jury. They endlessly asked me questions about the reasons for combining objects of different morphotypes into one cycle. Probably only one project had to be left. Then our concept would be more understandable, and the impression from it would be deep.
Another fundamental point for the presentation of projects at the WAF was the enormous attention paid by foreign competitors and members of the jury for the social significance of the projects. The question “What is the benefit of your project for people? What will change for the better in their lives from the implementation of your idea? was fundamental in the evaluation of competitive works. And it is better to be ready to answer it in advance. If one of the Russian architects decides to take part in the next festival, he must take into account all these points.
WAF Statistics 2009
Number of applications: more than 1500
Number of nominations: 42.
Buildings - 15 nominations. Interiors and product design - 8 nominations. Constructions - 9 nominations. Conceptual (futuristic) project - 10 nominations.
Geography of participants of the competition: 84 countries
Number of projects on the shortlist: 612
Number of Russian projects on the shortlist: 18
Number of media partners of the festival (professional publications): 61
