Lead Dušan 2017 - feedback from the judges

ARCHITECTURE

Jan Šépka
For two days, we walk through the school, gradually moving from one studio to another, carefully examining all the displayed projects. By the end of the first day, after a complete tour, I feel a great fatigue, not just me, but probably all the judges. On the second day, we only continue with the selected studios and projects that interest us. We want to study them more closely and also discuss them together. We read reports, debate, and think about the setting of topics and priorities in individual studios. Even though we must absorb nearly 1,000 projects over the two days, I am grateful for this, as in my ten years at the school, I never found enough time to go through all the exhibited projects so carefully. We agree that the working methods in the five studios impress us significantly. The studios of Císler, Kraus & Čančík, Kuzemenský & Synek, Novotný & Koňata & Zmek, and Redčenkov & Danda have their vision of architecture, which is clearly evident in the results at the school. Each studio has an apparent conception of the assignment of the topic and the mode of installation. From the students' works, one can see their commitment and enthusiasm for both their own project and the entire studio. The jury debates and struggles with the decision of whom to award just one Lead Dusán in both the studio and project categories. We do not want to create a parallel of a student competition like a superstar, and we ask ourselves whether it is even possible to evaluate equally high-quality approaches among architects or compare the design of a residential building with a new university building when we know that each is excellent in its category. What to do about it? Our decision at the end of the evening is not an alibi; it is not that we could not decide whom to give the award to. However, we do not want to award just one prize, neither for the studio nor for the project. Therefore, we suggest or raise the question for the future years of the Lead Dusán's operation. The jury unanimously agrees that it is important to think about the way of working at the school on a level that will not create a top ten list but will demonstrate the highest quality of the entire school. Thus, we award five equal prizes from the jury to five studios and four equal jury prizes to four projects. They are equally good and incomparable. For many years, it has not been a secret that high quality is represented by only a few studios, thanks to their own effort and passion for the craft itself. This is related to the downside of the presented results of school studios. The possibility of attending the FA ČVUT and not encountering architecture at all can be seen in several studios and in some exhibited projects. Generally, it is true that the weakest quality that the school is still capable of releasing is its baseline standard. It would be good for the school's management, after 27 years of post-revolutionary operation, to try to set this lower bar somehow.

Lukáš Brom
I am glad that I can also say the legendary phrase: “I did it all!”. Two days from morning till evening and a third day of staring at a wall – that's the harsh life of an ODU judge. So what did we see? I mainly saw the school itself; I had been here before for the opening, but I still don’t fully understand the meaning of the system of closed units/studios. Yes, there is a window, so they no longer have to be cut out, but it is just a window. May I take a small detour? The Lead Dusán was created as a critical independent perspective on the submitted works. The students created it themselves because they wanted feedback on their efforts. We arrived at the same conclusion in Liberec and founded Ještěd f kleci. We wanted to compete together, but also to send jolts to the poor studios to wake them up. But to be honest, I have always received the best (harshest) feedback from my classmates. It works perfectly, and if the organization of the school helps this or at least does not put up obstacles, it makes it easier. Thus, a window to the corridor is not enough. How else could it be possible that next to the great studios of David Kraus, Ondřej Císler, Boris Redčenkov, and a few others, there are right in the next rooms studios where some pyramids on the Slavonic Epic, etc., are created? It's a pity because we all have more potential. And we would then better understand, for example, the work from the Florián studio, regardless of what it is. I know I am simplifying and exaggerating because closed studios certainly allow for concentration on work – but both should be possible. Then the whole school would be full of perfect projects, we would come in, and in depression jump straight from the upper floors into the courtyard. And we wouldn’t experience excitement, boredom, surprising discoveries, fatigue, coffee, amazing assignments, and handmade collages where every tile is cut out from paper and glued, and the whole is beautiful – I’m not lying! I thank you all for that. Respect SPA. It was an experience and a surge of energy.

Pavel Buryška
During our walkthrough of the studios and evaluation of individual projects, it was hard not to notice that a fresh breeze lightly flows through the FA building. It seems that during the semester, students distance themselves from the rich bounty of assignments from “credited subjects,” focusing their time and energy on what is the most important – the studio and studio life. The level of projects, their high degree of sophistication, and the way of presentation are beginning to gradually improve compared to the outputs I had the opportunity to observe during my own studies at the Prague FA. The composition of the nominated studios, along with other factors, can gently hint at the circumstances of this revitalization. However, alongside the notable quantity of quality projects, one can observe a larger array of average to below-average works in the thousand submitted proposals. For a longer time, the question has been raised to what extent students, led by the Architecture Students' Association, can actively influence this situation so that the ratio of quality projects reaches at least more than half.
Could the competitive exhibition Lead Dusán help strengthen this movement? Does it fully utilize its potential with its own status and the presentation format of the winners?
It seems that the Lead Dusán award, possessing the statuette, has gained a badge of high prestige among students, which may restrict the broader essence of this exhibition. What message should the competition results send, within the existing context, to the audience and the faculty management? Does the tendency to select a faculty superstar prevail, or should the result represent a selection of the best that the “largest” Czech faculty of architecture has to offer?
During the two-day intense architectural discussion, the idea arose, which would be worth verifying. What if there were only one Dusán? One statuette, one trophy, on whose base the names of awarded authors and studios would layer across generations (including previous ones). It should have its honorable position, ideally in one of the halls of FA, always in view of the students, heads of studios, school management, graduates, and the wider audience, a mirror set up…


Matěj Draslar
I didn’t know what to expect. I never had the opportunity to study at ČVUT, and apart from touring the new building, I had little information about teaching at the faculty. The jury of Lead Dusán was an opportunity to spend two full days, in a great collective, focused on the work of students and teaching architecture at ČVUT. I would like to thank SPA and the jury for this.
I will try to summarize my main impressions as an unburdened and naive visitor in three short notes:

Contrasts and Constants
It is the school's task to provide students with a diverse offer of studios that represent different attitudes towards architecture and urbanism. At the same time, it should ensure the highest and most consistent quality across all studios. I was surprised by how large the differences are in the quality of submitted works in individual studios.

Laissez-faire and Firm Hand
An interesting question is how much the studio heads try to guide individual projects. We encounter various approaches that can be placed on a spectrum between two poles: on one side, students seemingly lack a focal point, leading to somewhat intangible projects, while on the other side, they have very clear assignments and develop a part of a pre-defined whole. I think it is important for students to try out different approaches. However, extreme positions on the described spectrum should be chosen consciously by the studios.

Topics and the Theme
In some studios, we discovered many different and also very diverse topics among the submitted works. Some are working on a competition for a new school of architecture, others are designing factories, some are creating observation towers, and others a family house, unrelated to their colleagues' work in the studio. We also encountered the opposite strategy: the studio heads provided a thematic framework that the entire studio shared. It is clearly recognizable that by concentrating efforts in one direction in the studio, discourse on the given topic can arise between students and the studio head, leading to greater depth and quality in individual projects.


DESIGN

Jan Činčera
Whenever I enter the Architecture building of ČVUT, I feel a desire to study in these inspiring spaces. Openness, communicativeness, transparency, cleanliness, this is what fascinates me.
All the more I was surprised, not only myself but also my fellow jurors, by the presented students' results. The very modern contemporary atmosphere of the building perhaps does not allow the individual works to stand out, which often got lost and were not very understandable at times.
Other than the "black" space suitable for presenting work in Professor Karel's studio, the studios were not very defined.
In evaluating previous years, I noted criticism of the quality level of the presented works; I must join this in this year's evaluation as well. I am used to working with materials and "hands," so the dramatically contradictory works from the first year immediately caught our attention – a broom and a dustpan, on one hand, a successful concept including execution, on the other hand, a fatal failure. In further studios and higher years, such a contradiction was not present, thanks to the guidance of educators, though there were significantly varying quality works there as well.
The still ongoing and oft-repeated claim that less is more and that everything is in detail and execution holds true here too; that is why the works of the first year are so readable and reveal that a good assignment can be recognized right from the beginning.
In other studios, of course with exceptions, the average and not many works spontaneously attracted me.
I did not try to distinguish the individual studios and assigned tasks too much; I let myself be carried away by the ideas of the students and their creativity, the straightforward persuasiveness of individual works.
The execution of individual works directly in materials is, of course, better, and therefore objects made of porcelain or glass are more convincing and evoke more emotions. It is not easy to evaluate complex models of electronic devices, stoves, radiators, and, for example, glass Christmas decorations against each other. Perhaps that is why we were most captivated by the glass decorations.

Šimon Brabec
The works assessed by our jury from the Department of Design did not really surprise us pleasantly except for a few exceptions. Many works feel like a game on design. Without an understanding of the "why" behind what students are proposing, they go straight to the formal exercises of "how" the object should look. When they have the object finished, they create a dressing, an idea, a concept in a few lines. If one reads the accompanying texts, one sees something completely different in reality.
The design process is shooting in the dark. There is a lack of research, development process. The presentation, which is maximally important in practice, is not emphasized properly. I don’t just mean graphic presentation, the level of model and prototype execution. Mainly, there is a lack of a clear formulation of the idea. Why is it better to hide a tiny box of a wifi modem into a bowl for fruit that is constantly tethered by a cable to the wall? An adequate answer is not to declare the wifi box as ugly; that can never hold water. Why is it better to hide archetypal tubular stoves into cladding? Basic theoretical principles like "less is more" are not sensed in the works. We did not compare individual studios among each other; each is distinctly differently defined. With distinctly weak works, I questioned the role of pedagogical guidance. Whether it would not be within the power of the heads to intervene a little more in the work process and broaden the student's horizons.

Ondřej Krynek
Being a judge in Lead Dusán is a great honor and a responsibility at the same time. The number of evaluated projects across all studios, including preparatory ones, was not small, and conscientious nominating required careful studying of the submitted materials. Even these materials indicated the qualities of individual projects and thus also of the students.
A greater than expected portion of the projects was a pleasant surprise. It was evident in these that students are capable of coming up with top-notch projects for specific assignments, developing models perfectly within their possibilities, and preparing a very decent presentation. Of course, there were also significant disappointments, even in higher years.
Significantly pleasing were the assignments in collaboration with other entities, especially commercial companies, allowing students to approach a real assignment more closely. These works, in sum, left the best impression.

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