Peter Wilson, partner in the Münster based office of BOLLES+WILSON, was recently awarded the AIA's (Australian Institute of Architects) highest honor, its 2013 Gold Medal. The recognition acknowledges Peter Wilson's role as remarkable statesman for Australia as well as an outstanding body of architectural works of great distinction, widely published and exhibited over more than thirty years. The Gold Medal also cites Wilson's longstanding contribution to the development of architectural drawing as a tool of representation and research. More information on Wilson's award after the break.
Previous AIA Gold Medal winner Glen Murcutt was present at this year's award ceremony in Canberra, Australia's capital city. The award evening began with a short talk by Aunty Agnes, an elder of the Ngunnawal people, the original indigenous people of the Canberra landscape, she gave the gathered architects permission to leave their footprints on the Ngunnawal peoples land.
Due to their geographic isolation Australians particularly respect success in the European forum where BOLLES+WILSON operate and have won many local and international competitions and prizes: New City Library - Münster, Luxor Theatre - Rotterdam, BEIC Library - Milan, New National Library - Luxembourg, Masterplan for the Albanian city of Korca, Masterplan for the Monteluce district of Perugia, and the Masterplan for the Christiansberg district of Copenhagen to name a few.
Peter Wilson was born in Melbourne in 1950. After three years at the University of Melbourne he completed his architectural studies at London's Architectural Association (Diploma Prize 1972). As Sir Peter Cook wrote for the AIA journal: "…at the AA that wily old fox, that brilliant chairman, Alvin Boyarsky, pulled him into the teaching staff at the earliest respectable moment, he became part of a junior competitive circus including Nigel Coates and Zaha Hadid". First assisting Elia Zhenghelis and Rem Koolhaas and then leading his own Diploma Unit, Wilson at the AA also met the German post graduate student Julia Bolles, together they established in 1980 the Wilson Partnership, which evolved into the Münster based architectural office BOLLES+WILSON.
The current Gold citation also commends Wilson's "intellectual contribution to thinking on Architecture" as well as "his dedication to teaching": first at the AA, then as guest professor at the Kunsthochschule Berlin-Weißensee and most recently at the Accademia di Architettura, Mendrisio. Again Peter Cook, "as a visiting examiner at the Bartlett and the AA he is thorough and sees through the bullshit".
