Coinciding with the organization’s 60th anniversary this year, The Graham Foundation has announced the list of recipients of their 2016 Grants to Organizations, a total of $419,000 (USD) to be given to 31 exemplary projects from around the world. The Organization Grants are awarded to projects displaying “originality, capacity, feasibility and potential for impact” and are divided amongst four categories: Exhibition, Film/Video/New Media, Public Program, and Publication.
In its 60 years, the foundation has made significant impacts in the fields of art and architecture through the awarding of grants to outstanding projects, exhibitions and publications. They have expanded their exhibition programming in the past few years, including a display at the inaugural Chicago Architecture Biennal last year.
Continue after the break for the full list of recipients.
EXHIBITION (16 awards)
ANYONE CORPORATION
New York, NY
The Architectural Imagination: US Pavilion, 15th International Architecture Exhibition
The United States Pavilion at the 2016 Venice Architecture Biennale, curated by Cynthia Davidson and Monica Ponce de Leon, presents twelve speculative architecture projects across four Detroit sites with far-reaching applications for cities around the world.
THE BRONX MUSEUM OF THE ARTS
New York, NY
Gordon Matta-Clark: Anarchitect
This project examines the artist’s groundbreaking impact on rethinking architecture after the fall of modernism’s urban utopia and demonstrates, through a distinctive exhibition and accompanying publication, the unique role of the Bronx in both his artistic development and sociopolitical engagement.
CALIFORNIA STATE UNIVERSITY LONG BEACH-UNIVERSITY ART MUSEUM
Long Beach, CA
Robert Irwin: Site Determined
Four decades of artist Robert Irwin’s work—site-determined outdoor environmental projects—are explored in this comprehensive exhibition of his drawings and architectural models.
CONTEMPORARY ART MUSEUM ST. LOUIS
St. Louis, MO
Urban Planning: Contemporary Art and the City, 1966–2017
Critical socioeconomic developments have resulted in the irrevocable transformation of North American cities through various stages of growth, decline, and revival—this exhibition features more than twenty international artists including Mark Bradford, Abigail DeVille, Glenn Ligon, Josiah McElheny, Catherine Opie, Michael Rakowitz, Robert Smithson, and Sara Van Der Beek, among others whose work demonstrates how such conditions offer fertile ground for artistic inquiry today.
ISTANBUL FOUNDATION FOR CULTURE AND ARTS
Istanbul, Turkey
Are We Human?, 3rd Istanbul Design Biennial
Opening this October, curators Beatriz Colomina and Mark Wigley put forward eight interlinked propositions around the topic “Are We Human? The Design of the Species: 2 seconds, 2 years, 200 years, 200,000 years.”
THE JEWISH MUSEUM
New York, NY
Pierre Chareau: Modern Architecture and Design
This first US retrospective of French modernist Pierre Chareau—known for ingeniously integrating traditional craftsmanship with Machine Age–advances—showcases his creative contributions as an architect, artist, and furniture designer, within the context of his extraordinary life and Jewish cultural background.
LIGA-SPACE FOR ARCHITECTURE
Mexico City, Mexico
LIGA Exhibition Program, 2016–2017
LIGA’s annual program will consist of four exhibitions, in which emerging studios from across Latin America intervene in their Insurgents’ Avenue gallery space, along with conferences, workshops, debates, and performances, each of which explore tangential relationships with architecture.
LIVERPOOL BIENNIAL OF CONTEMPORARY ART
Liverpool, United Kingdom
Céline Condorelli: Liverpool Biennial 2016 Portals
Céline Condorelli’s artworks sit between architecture and contemporary art—here they will serve as gateways to access the fictional worlds of the 2016 Liverpool Biennial, which will unfold through the landscape of the city.
LOS ANGELES FORUM FOR ARCHITECTURE AND URBAN DESIGN
Los Angeles, CA
Tu casa es mi casa
Two modernist houses—the Neutra VDL Studio and Residence in Los Angeles and the Archivo house by Arturo Chávez Paz in Mexico City—are brought together via the exchange of narrative texts, industrial objects, and installations by contemporary architects/artists, including Frida Escobedo, Aris Janigian, Pedro&Juana, and Katya Tylevich.
MADISON SQUARE PARK CONSERVANCY
New York, NY
Prismatic Park: Colored Glass to Destroy Hatred
Artist Josiah McElheny will create an outdoor, multidisciplinary exhibition uniting architectural form, sculpture, and performing arts to explore the ongoing urgency of public space as a place for and catalyst of cultural expression and inclusion.
MUSEUM OF CONTEMPORARY ART TUCSON
Tucson, AZ
The World Would Burn without Rain
The architecture office Aranda\Lasch and artist Terrol Dew Johnson collaborate to showcase a collection of experimental new work that blends traditional Native American craft with contemporary design.
MUSEUM OF MODERN ART
New York, NY
Frank Lloyd Wright at 150: Unpacking the Archive
The Museum of Modern Art’s major exhibition critically engages the recently acquired Wright archive, offering new interpretations of this rich trove to the public, 150 years after the birth of the seminal modern American architect.
NATIONAL BUILDING MUSEUM
Washington, DC
Secret Cities: The Architecture and Planning of the Manhattan Project
This exhibition examines the innovative architecture, construction, and planning of three cities built from scratch by the US government during World War II—Oak Ridge, Tennessee; Los Alamos, New Mexico; and Hanford/Richland, Washington—in order to produce the first atomic bomb.
SERPENTINE GALLERY
London, United Kingdom
Serpentine Pavilion and Summer Houses 2016
The Serpentine Architecture Programme expands this year with the addition of four newly commissioned Summer Houses by Kunlé Adeyemi, Barkow Leibinger, Yona Friedman, and Asif Khan, which join the 2016 Serpentine Pavilion by Bjarke Ingels Group.
SWISS INSTITUTE
New York, NY
Display
Curated by Niels Olsen and Fredi Fischli, this conceptual project explores the tension in exhibiting architecture through layering modes of display in an atmospheric installation consisting of architectural drawings.
UNIVERSITY OF CHICAGO-NEUBAUER COLLEGIUM FOR CULTURE AND SOCIETY & SMART MUSEUM OF ART
Chicago, IL
Fantastic Architecture: Vostell, Fluxus, and the Built Environment and Vostell Concrete, 1969– 1973
In conjunction with the reinstallation of Concrete Traffic (1970)—a major public sculpture by leading Fluxus artist Wolf Vostell—on the University of Chicago campus, two original exhibitions examine Vostell’s use of concrete against the contexts of postwar art, architecture, and urbanism, and explore the Fluxus movement’s engagement with public space and the built environment.
FILM/VIDEO/NEW MEDIA (1 award)
MONOAMBIENTE
Buenos Aires, Argentina
Amancio Williams 2.0
Working with documents from the archive of Argentine architect Amancio Williams, this project will introduce Williams’s work to an international audience, while formulating a new vision of how to develop a living archive.
PUBLIC PROGRAM (3 awards)
CAMPO
Bogota, Colombia
Colombian Architecture Banal
Envisioned to become a space reflecting upon architectural practice, this public program aims to discuss the production of the public sphere and question the proliferation of the biennial as a model for the “exhibition,” rather than reflection, of architecture.
LAMPO
Chicago, IL
Lampo 2016 Concert Series at the Graham Foundation
A concert series presenting the work of music’s leading experimentalists, bringing musicians and composers from North America, South America, Europe, and Asia to Chicago.
SOCIETY OF ARCHITECTURAL HISTORIANS
Chicago, IL
Making and Re-Making Glasgow: Heritage and Sustainability
This seminar seeks to bring new perspectives and audiences to the dialogue addressing regeneration, preservation, and sustainability for Glasgow and other post-industrial cities as it relates to housing, open spaces, and waterways, particularly Glasgow’s River Clyde.
PUBLICATION (11 awards)
ARAB IMAGE FOUNDATION
Beirut, Lebanon
Rifat Chadirji: Architecture Photo Index
A comprehensive publication of Iraqi architect Rifat Chadirji’s photographic folio that records and analyzes the development of his building practice in and around Baghdad from 1952 through the early 1980s.
ARCHITECTURAL ASSOCIATION
London, United Kingdom
In Progress: The IID Summer Sessions
Featuring a wealth of previously unpublished archival material, this book, edited by Irene Sunwoo, documents the history of Alvin Boyarsky’s International Institute of Design Summer Sessions (1970-72), an experimental school that convened architects, educators, planners, and students from across the world for the global exchange of emerging design strategies, teaching methods, and theoretical positions.
ART INSTITUTE OF CHICAGO
Chicago, IL
As Seen: Exhibitions that Made Architecture and Design History
One of the first publications to explore the influence of architecture and design exhibitions long after their closing date.
CHICAGO ARCHITECTURE BIENNIAL
Chicago, IL
The State of the Art of Architecture
The curatorial team of the 2015 Chicago Architecture Biennial invited practicing architects to converse with leading cultural figures, resulting in a collection of original texts that serve as both a legacy of the first Biennial and an invaluable survey of ideas and positions in architecture today.
GUAYABA PRESS
Mexico City, Mexico
Sur 3: Esther McCoy: The Mexican Years
Taking as its starting point the connections between architectural critic Esther McCoy and Mexico, this publication includes moments from her personal life, her political and artistic acquaintances, her writings while in Mexico, and the relationships the writer started with some of the most emblematic figures of modern Mexican history.
MAS CONTEXT
Chicago, IL
MAS Context, Issues 33–36
A quarterly design journal that addresses issues that affect the urban context, providing a comprehensive view of a single topic through the participation of people from different fields and different perspectives.
PLACES JOURNAL
San Francisco, CA
Places Journal: Writers Fund
This capacity-building initiative will allow Places Journal to proactively commission agenda-setting articles and to support the valuable intellectual labor of research, reportage, and critique.
PROJECT: A JOURNAL FOR ARCHITECTURE
Los Angeles, CA
Project: A Journal for Architecture, Issue No. 6
Focused on publishing the work of emerging practices and critics, this print and online platform engages critical writing and architectural projects as a serious forum for work and thought on the discipline of architecture today.
TERREFORM
New York, NY
UR (Urban Research), Volumes 07–11
This book series, edited by Michael Sorkin, devoted to speculation about the conditions and the future of the city continues to establish UR and Terreform as key venues for both individuals and organizations engaged in progressive urban research, design, and critical advocacy.
UNIVERSITY OF JOHANNESBURG
Johannesburg, South Africa
Folio
A dynamic internationally peer-reviewed publication that will focus on emerging discourses of architecture, education, and urbanism across the African continent.
VERLAG DER BUCHHANDLUNG WALTHER KÖNIG
Cologne, Germany
Thomas Demand: Model Studies I & II
Exploring the work of architects John Lautner and SANAA, German sculptor and photographer Thomas Demand focuses his lens on the pockets, edges, and corners of architectural models made from materials such as paper and cardboard.
About the Graham Foundation
Founded in 1956, the Graham Foundation for Advanced Studies in the Fine Arts makes project-based grants to individuals and organizations, and produces programming designed to foster the development and exchange of diverse and challenging ideas about architecture and its role in the arts, culture, and society.
The Graham Foundation was created by a bequest from Ernest R. Graham (1866–1936), a prominent Chicago architect and protégé of Daniel Burnham.
Upcoming Grant Application Deadlines
Grants to Individuals: September 15, 2016
Carter Manny Award: November 15, 2016
Grants to Organizations: January 25, 2017
News via The Graham Foundation.
