TRIENNALE MILANO and MAXXI – Italian Architecture Award, the winners

TRIENNALE MILANO and MAXXI – Italian Architecture Award, the winners.

Thursday July 13th, took place at the Triennale Milano la awards ceremony of the fourth edition of the Italian Architecture Award – annual project promoted by Triennale and MAXXI – National Museum of 21st Century Arts, which sees the two institutions collaborate for the valorization of Italian architecture, through the promotion of works created by Italian designers or those active in Italy, whose commitment is aimed at innovation, project quality and the social role of architecture.

In during the awards ceremony speakers: Stefano Boeri, President of Triennale Milano; Alessandro Giuli, President of the MAXXI Foundation; Nina Bassoli, Curator of Architecture, Urban Regeneration and the City at Triennale; Lorenza Baroncelli, Director of MAXXI Architecture; Pippo Ciorra, Senior curator MAXXI Architecture.

Stefano Boeri, President of Triennale MilanoSaid: “We are very happy to consolidate the collaboration with MAXXI, welcoming the fourth edition of the Italian Architecture Award to the Triennale. All the selected projects are characterized by their extraordinary quality and great capacity for experimentation. The Award highlights the most significant proposals on the contemporary architecture scene, which propose innovative and concrete solutions to the complex issues of the present. We are also happy to be able to award the Lifetime Achievement Award to Aimaro Oreglia d'Isola who, even during his partnership with Roberto Gabetti, was able to mark an era of innovative and surprising creations, from the homes of Ivrea to the Milanese projects for the area Bicocca and for the offices in San Donato".

Alessandro Giuli, President of the MAXXI Foundation, stated: “The Italian Architecture Award is the product of a virtuous collaboration between Triennale Milano and MAXXI which has lasted for four years. In this period the two teams worked very well in parallel and contributed to the celebration of important designers and the promotion of young talents, who after the award saw their professional and cultural dimension grow. The agreement expires in September this year; of course my hope is mine I am committed to renewing this collaboration, which is good for both the two institutions and the entire Italian architecture movement."

Le nominations for the Best Building Award they have been entrusted to a group of experts, nominated by Triennale and MAXXI. For the Under 35 Award, in addition to the advisors' reports, the possibility of self-nomination. For the Lifetime Achievement Award the assignment has been made directly from the Jury. The international jury of the fourth edition of the Italian Architecture Award – composed by Stefano Boeri, President of Triennale Milano; Nina Bassoli, Curator of Architecture, Urban Regeneration and the City at Triennale; Lorenza Baroncelli, Director of MAXXI Architecture; Pippo Ciorra, Senior curator MAXXI Architettura, Matteo Scagnol of MoDusArchitects, winner of the Best Building Award in 2022, Valentina Merz and Lara Monacelli Bani of Atelier Remoto, winner of NXT_MAXXI L'Aquila in 2022, whose vote is considered unitary, Iñaqui Carnicero, founding architect of Rica Studio, and Giancarlo Mazzanti, architect and founder of the El Equipo Mazzanti studio – resolved the winners on a shortlist of 10 projects finalists identified out of 30 applications proposed by the group of advisors. For the under 35 Award, the jury identified 5 finalist projects out of 17 applications.

The Award for the best building created in the last 3 years was awarded ex-aequo to Carlo Atzeni, Maurizio Manias, Silvia Mocci, Franceschino Serra for the project of the parish complex and church of Santa Chiara (Sini, Oristano, 2021) and to ELASTICOFarm for the project for the new complex of the National Institute for Nuclear Physics (INFN) S-LAB. (Turin, 2020). The jury recognizes that the Parish complex of Santa Chiara "it is located in the central area of ​​the small town of Sini, in internal Sardinia, with formal rigor and contextual awareness, taking the opportunity to stitch together a series of spatial, expressive and relational elements of the central fabric. Interpreting typical elements of local spontaneous construction and a sober architecture of the Mediterranean koiné, the project acts in a difficult context to renew the meaningful connections with the communities.”

La jury found in the project S-LAB "one of the most representative examples of the studio's linguistic-technological research work. It gives a strong character to a theoretically 'generic' building typology, transforming it into an opportunity for research. The building, in fact, transforms the traditional technology for production buildings, heavy prefabrication in reinforced concrete, into an opportunity for all-round experimentation in its relationship with the context, and in its environmental, atmospheric, perceptive and landscape declinations".

Honorable mention was awarded to Labics, for the completion of the Museum areas of Palazzo dei Diamanti (Ferrara, 2022). The jury highlighted how “the restoration, enhancement and expansion project of the Palace is a virtuous example of architectural intervention as a tool for reinterpreting and functionally and culturally updating a historic building of enormous value. The project deserves recognition not only for its intrinsic quality but also for having established itself despite the presence of pseudo-preservationist prejudices and resistance that it had to face"

Obsidian Studio is the vincitore of the Under 35 Award for the Art Pavillion project M. (Almere, Netherlands, 2022) and receives the award of 10.000 € to be used for projects/training. The project was selected by jury so long as "combines in a single synthetic gesture the main characteristics of the studio's work, which began with great clarity albeit only a few years ago, between formal research and sensitive investigation on environmental issues and interspecies relationships in architecture and landscape"  The jury also decided to award a mention to Paraphernalia of (ab)Normal and More with Less horizontal.

Il Lifetime Achievement Award was awarded to Aimaro Oreglia d'Isola, approved unanimously by the jury with the following motivation: “the career of Aimaro Oreglia d'Isola has nourished the architectural debate around the themes of the relationship between modernity and tradition, natural and artificial, territory and landscape, throughout the second half of the twentieth century, ferrying them to today, where they appear to us more than ever current. The studio's originality asserted itself from the first years of activity, soon triggering an intense debate at an international level on the meaning of modern architecture in relation to local history and cultures. Together with the intense academic activity and the value of drawing which in turn constitutes a further parallel research path, the thought and practice of Aimaro Oreglia d'Isola have given and continue to give a decisive contribution to architecture, understood as a palimpsest cultural and as a landscape.”

I projects of the winners and finalists of the Italian Architecture Award are brought together in an exhibition in Three-year Milano which will remain open from 14 July to 24 September 2023.