Czech Architecture Award 2017 - exhibition opening at GAB

The Architecture Gallery Brno, in collaboration with the Czech Chamber of Architects, presents the Czech Award for Architecture 2017, which will showcase to the Brno audience 42 nominated works from the second year of the competition that made it to the shortlist of the international jury from a total of 249 submitted projects. Six finalists will be introduced in detail, including the main award winners Radko Květo and Pavel Pijáček for the implementation of the Archeopark Pavlov. The opening will take place with the participation of Radko Květo and several other finalists on Tuesday, February 13, 2018, at 5:00 PM at the Architecture Gallery Brno. The exhibition will be available for viewing from February 14 to March 9, 2018, from Tuesday to Sunday from 10:00 AM to 6:00 PM. Admission is voluntary.
The finalists from the 42 nominees were selected by an international jury led by chairwoman Marianne Loof (Netherlands). Other members included Matija Bevk (Slovenia), Eelco Hooftman (Netherlands/Scotland), Jiří Oplatek (Czech Republic/Switzerland), Jakub Szczęsny (Poland), Doris Wälchli (Switzerland), and Ľubomír Závodný (Slovakia). They met at the beginning of September directly in the Czech Republic to personally view the selected nominated projects. The jurors agreed on three criteria to identify outstanding architecture. Firstly, they assessed the architectural quality of the project in terms of the strength of the concept, relationship to the site, structural and material solution, and architectural details of the building. Secondly, they considered the social aspects and the contribution of the design to society as a whole. Finally, they focused on the added value of the building concerning the brief and the interests of the client.
The main award was given by the jurors to the project Archeopark Pavlov (2016) by the Brno architectural firm Radko Květo. Authors Radko Květo and Pavel Pijáček, along with their team, tackled the location of the historical museum directly in the area of a significant archaeological site, where there was a settlement from the Upper Paleolithic period. The site has been a national cultural monument since 2010. The museum building is hidden four meters below the surface in a terrain wave, in areas that archaeologists have already fully explored. In the past, researchers found a Venus figurine from Pavlov made of mammoth ivory at the site. The authors proceeded from the assumption that any further archaeological finds would be four to five meters below the surface. The exterior features light wells, a funnel-shaped entrance, and views of the Pavlov Hills and the Nové Mlýny reservoir. The building is meant to evoke the spatially shaped cave spaces. The creators directly incorporated, for example, the find of mammoth bones into the exhibition.
The Honorary Award Finalist of the Czech Award for Architecture 2017 was awarded to five other diverse works in addition to the winning project. Besides the main award, two are also from South Moravia. One is the House in a Brick Garden (Jan Proksa, Architect, 2016), a brick new building of a small house sensitively and elegantly embedded in the traditional development of Prušánky, and the second is the Furniture Gallery (CHYBIK+KRISTOF Architects & Urban Designers, 2016) in Brno's Vinohrady, a single-storey building with a facade covered with more than nine hundred black plastic seats and an interior functioning on the principle of a gallery. Among the finalists this year was one work arising from an architectural competition – the Máj Community Center (SLLA Architects, 2014). This is a new building for social care services focused on children and youth in the namesake housing estate in České Budějovice. Additionally, the jury included the Cottage by the Lake (FAM Architekti, 2014), a year-round recreation facility in Doksy, and the Javornická Distillery (ADR, 2016), a new facility for a fruit distillery, the residence of its owner, orchard, and garden resulting from a partial reconstruction of a South Bohemian farm estate from the late 19th century.
Within the framework of the Czech Award for Architecture, exceptional activities in the field of architecture are also recognized. Nominations are made by members of the Academy and the Grémium of the Czech Chamber of Architects. Academics voted for the exceptional act on the award's web portal. This year, three awards were given for Exceptional Acts – to the House of Art in České Budějovice for the curatorial activities of Michal Škoda, another award went to the Mayors of the town of Litomyšl for their continuous work for the city, which led to the emergence of an extraordinary phenomenon in the town of Litomyšl, and the third Exceptional Act is the radio program by Czech Radio Wave and Adam Gebrian – Demolition.
Four extraordinary awards were also granted: The Extraordinary VELUX Award for the best work with daylight in the interior, the Extraordinary Karlín Group Award for committed approaches to the conservation and creation of exceptional public spaces, the Extraordinary Award of the Agency for Nature Conservation and Landscape Protection of the Czech Republic for high-quality modern architecture sensitively inserted into the landscape, and the Extraordinary Award of the Ministry of Industry and Trade for the approach and revitalization of an industrial facility.

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