Just over two months after the start of the 2019 edition of "The Poetics of Reason", the Lisbon Architecture Triennale and the Millennium BCP Foundation are pleased to announce the winner of the 5th edition of the Lisbon Triennial Millennium BCP Award.
With this award, “we celebrate Denise Scott Brown's legacy and future as a gift to the following generations of architects on a global scale”, announces the jury consisting of Amale Andraos, Claudia Taborda, Enrique Walker, Eric Lapierre, Kunle Adeyemi, Momoyo Kaijima and Sharon Johnston.
The recognition is given to a voice of undeniable importance in architecture, a name that for over 40 years has solidified its relevance as an architect, urban planner, teacher, writer, photographer and director. The vision and consistency of her body of work has made her an icon, an unsurpassed reference in the world of architecture and contemporary art.
Leonor Antunes, Portugal's representative at the last Venice Art Biennial (2019), is the artist who was commissioned to create an original piece to honor Denise Scott Brown, who joins the group of previous winners: Vittorio Gregotti (2007), Álvaro Siza Vieira (2010), Kenneth Frampton (2013) and the duo Lacaton & Vassal (2016).
About Denise Scott Brown
"Urban design should not be confused with large-scale architectural design or the pursuit of beautiful visuals. Our ideas should emerge from an understanding of urban processes and the patterns formed by urban activities." — Denise Scott Brown (Learning from Las Vegas, 1972).
Born in Zambia, she grew up in South Africa, but it was in the United States where she, along with her late husband Robert Venturi, unforgettably marked architecture - both with her pioneering theories and provocative practice. Her multidisciplinary approach to architecture has redefined the link between the disciplines of design and urban planning, defied the rules of design and photography, and raised key issues in the field of social responsibility. She questioned the modernists in giving the same importance to the design of exterior spaces as well as interior spaces, having been one of the leading names in the forefront of the postmodern movement.
Author of the still seminal book, Learning from Las Vegas, she ventured a non-dogmatic formal vocabulary, defended her modest urban interventions and did not shy away from Mannerist risks. In a world dominated by men, she still stood out for her spirit, that is both free and intelligent and transgressive.
“When architects, urban scholars and professionals are invited to think about the built environment on all its scales, Denise Scott Brown's work is an inspiring example of what is possible: crossing disciplinary boundaries to design new ones. The possibilities of architecture as a form of research and as a practice. (...) Scott Brown taught us freedom. ”
