This prize is awarded annually for a building built by RIBA members outside the EU. Moreover, the selection is multi-stage: first, the Royal Institute of British Architects awards the International Award (RIBA International Awards), this year it has 13 laureates; then candidates for the Lubetkin Prize are selected from among them: in 2011 there are five of them.
Among the applicants are Zaha Hadid with the building of the luxurious Opera in Guangzhou, Norman Foster with two buildings at once: a new wing of the Museum of Art in Boston and the campus of the Institute of Science and Technology of the city of Masdar (by the way, Masdar is an innovation city in the UAE desert, similar to Skolkovo; its master plan was also done by Lord Foster's bureau). The two remaining shortlisted spots are shared by The Met, built by WOHA and Tandem Architects 2001 in Bangkok, and the Virginia Museum of Art in Richmond, by Rick Mater.
The Lyubetkin Prize does not imply a monetary prize, only fame: its laureate will receive a bronze sculpture created on the basis of a model of a penguin pool in the London Zoo, the most famous work of the Russian-British avant-garde artist of the 1930s Berthold Lyubetkin. The winner will be announced at the same time as the Stirling Prize Laureate at a ceremony on October 1, 2011.
Yu T.
