CURRENT NEWS & ANNOUNCEMENTS

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RMIT ARCHITECTURE STUDENT PROJECT WINS ARCHITECTURE AUSTRALIA UNBUILT PRIZE 2011
RMIT Architecture student Ton Vu has been awarded the 2011 Architecture Australia Prize for Unbuilt Work for his final year design thesis project, Sai Gon Informal, a bottom-up urban proposal for adaptable informal housing in Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam. The prize includes an award of $3000.

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RMIT LAUNCHES ARCHITECTURAL COMMISSIONS SELECTION FRAMEWORK
RMIT University recently launched Australian Selection Framework – a pioneering program to support innovative Australian architects and new architectural talent. Focused on individuals rather than practices, the program includes peer engagement, mentoring and professional support, while emerging architects will be paired with larger firms that can support their work. Architects involved in the framework will be applicable to be pre-qualified for RMIT architectural commissions and will, therefore, support RMIT’s Capital Works Program. RMIT invites qualified architects, emerging architects, and architectural firms interested in acting as support for emerging architects, to express their interest in the program between 22 August and 9 September on the RMIT tenders website.

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JOINT MOBILITY EXCHANGE PROGRAM
European exchange for architecture students

RMIT Bachelor and Masters Architecture students have the opportunity to take part in an EU and  government-funded exchange program in Europe. Australian Government funding up to $8,000 is available. Participating overseas universities include:

* Escola Tecnica Superior d’Arquitectura de Barcelona (ETSAB), Universitat Politecnica de Catalunya, Spain
* Ecole Nationale Superieure d’architecture de Toulouse, France
* Politecnico di Torino, Italy

The exchange program supports a series of international travelling studios and design workshops with a particular focus on architectural design responses to the challenges of climate change.

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RMIT ARCHITECTURE STUDENT PROJECT WINS CUMULUS GREEN AWARD
RMIT Architecture graduate Mike White has won the Cumulus Green Award for his RMIT Architecture Design Thesis project "Landscape Urbanism" supervised by Mel Dodd and Diego Ramirez-Lovering. This project proposes sustainable low-income housing and community infrastructure in a site located between an urban village and an informal shanty settlement in Port Moresby, Papua New Guinea. It offers short stay accommodation for migrant workers, which is the largest concern for the city in terms of urban policy for future development. This project also provides permanent housing for employees of a Community Learning Hub and temporary short- stay eco-tourism accommodation for volunteer workers on a working holiday. The project seeks to extend the economic, social and cultural resources of a marginalised indigenous community as a model for self sufficient and sustainable urban housing typologies, productive landscape infrastructure, social services and local economic opportunities.

Cumulus Green is an international design prize focused on solutions which cultivate and lead global cultures, societies and industries toward ecological and responsible solutions. The International Cumulus Green award was announced in Shanghai, China on 8 September 2010 during the Cumulus conference ‘Young creators for Better city, better life' hosted by Tongji University. The winning work was chosen from among 400 projects submitted for the Cumulus 20th Anniversary Exhibition; the jury consisted of Cumulus President and Executive Board members. The award consists of award certificate and 2000 EUR.

The RMIT Architecture submissions to the Cumulus 20th Anniversary Exhibition were curated by Brent Allpress.

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RMIT PROFESSOR MARK BURRY, SIAL RESEARCH FELLOW JANE BURRY AND RESEARCHER BARNABY BENNETT FEATURE IN GAUDI DOCUMENTARY
Liquid Stone: Unlocking Gaudi's Secrets
produced by Circe Films and Splice Ltd in association with Film Victoria, Screen Australia and NZ on Air
Originally broadcast on ABC2, Australia, Sunday July 25, 2010
Rebroadcast on ABC1, 3:30pm, Sunday August 1, 2010
available to view online via ABC iView until Sunday August 8, 2010

This televised documentary features Professor Mark Burry, Director of RMIT Spatial Information Architecture Laboratory (SIAL) and the RMIT Design Research Institute, Jane Burry, RMIT SIAL Research Fellow, and SIAL researcher Barnaby Bennett. It details their contributions to the collective project to complete Gaudi's Sagrada Familia in Barcelona. Interviews with Executive Architect Prof Mark Burry and Project Architect Jane Burry focus particularly on the role of emerging digital design technologies and practices in the design development and fabrication of Gaudi's unfinished masterwork.

Documentary available online until Sunday August 8, 2010:
Liquid Stone: Unlocking Gaudi's Secrets

Trailer Video:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=g5ENdjJhz-s

RMIT Spatial Information Architecture Laboratory (SIAL)
http://www.sial.rmit.edu.au

RMIT News Article:
http://rmit.mobi/browse;ID=lzo6h3jw45f01

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RMIT ARCHITECTURE STAFF AND STUDENTS EXHIBITING IN THE LONDON FESTIVAL OF ARCHITECTURE
RMIT Architecture: 1:1 One [two] One - Urban Installations from Melbourne
in the International Architecture Student Festival (IASF)
London Festival of Architecture, 19 June - 4 July, 2010
Exhibitors:
RMIT Architecture Studio Leaders Leanne Zilka & Gretchen Wilkins, with John Cherry & RMIT Master of Architecture (professional) students:
Mak Alex, Nik Kellina Bakti, Jonathan Barzel, Maximilien Forget, Timothy Heron, Ashini Erangi Kulatunge, Bronwyn Litera, Mathilde Lucas, Xiaozhou Qin, Oscar Sainsbury, Shann Ching Lee Yi Ting, Pei Yong

IASF Webpage: RMIT Architecture: 1:1 One [two] One

The International Architecture Student Festival asked design students from all over the UK and internationally to create a series of site-specific interventions in two key public spaces in London responding to the theme of Reduce, Reuse, Recycle, exhibited as part of the London Festival of Architecture.

1:1 ONE [two] ONE design studio from RMIT Architecture bridges the gap between London and Melbourne by producing full-scale installations for "twin" sites across both cities, exhibited as part of the London Festival of Architecture and the State of Design Festival in Melbourne. Using laminate sheets reclaimed from the local waste stream, the projects revisit the post-war “Make Do and Mend” culture of creative reuse and material harvesting, finding alternative applications for a highly discarded architectural product. Designed in Melbourne and shipped overseas, each project devises a way to digitally reprocess the sheets into flat-packable assemblies which conform to standard international luggage dimensions and weights. The ready-made architectural cargo is scheduled to arrive in London in June as part of the International Architecture Student Festival.

Participating schools include:
RMIT; Cambridge University; University of Innsbruck; Cardiff University; Arts University College Bournemouth; Central Saint Martins; Oxford Brookes; Ravensbourne; Canterbury School of Architecture; Central Saint Martins; Kingston University; London Metropolitan University; Kyung Won and Dong Yang Universities; Parma University

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RMIT STAFF EXHIBITING IN THE LONDON FESTIVAL OF ARCHITECTURE
Australia: Emoh Ruo - Global Practices of Australian Architecture
Bridge Gallery
Westminster University School of Architecture, London
International Architecture Showcase at the London Festival of Architecture 2010
19 - 23 June, 2010
Australian Curator: Cameron Bruhn, Architecture Media
Exhibitors include:
Paul Minifie, Johan van Schaik, Minifie Nixon;
Kokkugia; Point Supreme Architects; Mcgregor Coxall; BVN; Hassell

Website: http://www.emohruo-exhibition.com/

What contributes to the idea of a place as it exists in the mind’s eye? In cities, towns and regions across the world, vernacular ‘welcome to’ signs romantically define the image of a place at a defined boundary. Arrival and the idea of the locality are one. This singular arrival gesture expresses civic pride and ambitions, orientates and sometimes imparts useful information. These bureaucratic or statistical boundaries are generally static, while the built and experienced boundaries of a place are not.

As a place grows, the visibility of its edges are diminished and the marking power of the welcome signpost wanes. Many localities are too big to perceive at a glance and the view from Google Earth is dissociated from experience ­ once you’re close enough to see your own house, you can no longer see the whole city. If a locale cannot be summarised with a discrete image painted on a sign, how then is the image of it created?

The exhibition proposes that architecture can act like a series of magnifying glasses laid over a map, bringing into exaggerated focus the experiences and elements that define a place. Presented by the Australian High Commission London and organised by Architecture Media, emoh rou will explore Australian architecture in three modes ­ vernacular, built and speculative.

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RMIT STAFF AND STUDENTS PARTICIPATING IN AN INTERNATIONAL WORKSHOP AT DIE ANGEWANDTE VIENNA
Alessi MUTANTS
Tom Kovac, RMIT Architecture and Reiner Zettl, die Angewandte
24 June 2010 - 24 July 2010
die Angewandte, Institut für Architektur, Vienna
http://www.urbanstrategies.at/

The Alessi MUTANTS program is a 4-week intensive postgraduate course in emergent digital directions within object and architectural design. The course aims at investigating and exploring the systems, processes, and techniques of Alessi design in the context of studio, research, and practice. The purpose is to develop scaleable geometries that will assist in the development of objects and architectural forms.

The students will explore design mutations with a single project, probing materials and production techniques of Alessi design. The workshop and the accompaning seminars will focus on the challenges of developing and expanding the domain of Alessi object design in the context of emerging technologies in the design and production of objects and architecture.

Located in Vienna, Alessi MUTANTS will be in the context of the Architecture Department at the University of Applied Arts, where design studios by Wolf Prix, Zaha Hadid, and Greg Lynn set the standard, enabling the students to participate in a unique teaching and learning environment.

The final review of student projects will be located at the Alessi Headquarters in Omegna, Italy taking advantage of the location and presence of Alberto Alessi, Gloria Barcellini and Alessi Projects Engineer Danilo Alliata. Students will also have an unprecedented opportunity to tour the Alessi dream factory and the Alessi Museum.

Alessi MUTANTS Poster pdf




RMIT ARCHITECTURE STAFF AND STUDENTS INVITED TO EXHIBIT IN THE AUSTRIAN PAVILION AT THE VENICE BIENNALE EXHIBITION
Alessi MUTANTS
The work of the RMIT students participating in the Alessi MUTANTS workshop at die Angewandte will be exhibited in the Austrian Pavilion at the Venice Architecture Biennale, 2010

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RMIT ARCHITECTURE ACADEMICS AND ALUMNI SELECTED TO EXHIBIT AT THE VENICE BIENNALE 2010
The creative directors of the Australian Pavilion exhibition at the 2010 Venice Architecture Biennale have announced that the selected exhibitors in the Australian exhibition will include RMIT Architecture academics Peter Corrigan (Edmond and Corrigan), Stuart Harrison (Harrison and White) and RMIT Adjunct Professor James Brearley (BAU).

RMIT Architecture postgraduate alumni who have been selected to exhibit include Richard Goodwin (Richard Goodwin Art/Architecture), Gerard Reinmuth (TERROIR), John Wardle (John Wardle Architects), Marcus White (Harrison and White), Eli Giannini (MGS) and Michael Spooner

RMIT Architecture Professional degree alumni who have been selected to exhibit include Timothy Black, Simon Knott and Julian Kosloff (BKK), Peter Raisbeck, Ben Statkus (Statkus Architecture), Edmund Carter and Catherine Ranger

RAIA Media Release
Final selection for Australia’s "urban dreaming" to unfold in Venice

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ANTARCTICA, BAU & RMIT ARCHITECTURE & DESIGN AWARDED FEDERAL GOVERNMENT GRANT
Antarctica Group Pty Ltd, whose Directors include RMIT Architecture academics Graham Crist and Simon Whibley, has been awarded an Australia International Cultural Council grant of $19,000 for an architectural design research project and collaboration between Antarctica Group Architects,  RMIT University School of Architecture and Design, and BAU International Architects in Shanghai,  China, founded by Director James Brearly, RMIT Architecture Adjunct Professor. This research project involves a comparative study of the urban design and related issues of Melbourne and Shanghai. The project will culminate in a design exhibition and publication of the work in Shanghai in 2010, with associated lectures.

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MUF HAVE BEEN APPOINTED CURATORS OF BRITISH PAVILION AT VENICE ARCHITECTURE BIENNALE
muf art and architecture have been appointed curators of the British Pavilion in the Venice Architecture Biennale, 2010.

muf are:
Liza Fior, Partner; Yale Visiting Professor
Katherine Clarke, Artist Partner
Mel Dodd, Architect; RMIT Architecture Program Director

British Pavilion Artistic Directors Appointed for the Venice Biennale
British Council Arts

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RMIT ACADEMICS INVITED TO EXHIBIT AT THE LONDON FESTIVAL OF ARCHITECTURE
RMIT Architecture academics Paul Minifie and Jan van Schaik, Practice Directors of Minifie Nixon
have been invited together with Architectural Media publishers by the Australian High Comission, London to exhibit work at the London Festival of Architecture in 2010.

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RMIT ARCHITECTURE ACADEMICS AWARDED AUSTRALIA CHINA COUNCIL RESEARCH PUBLISHING GRANT
RMIT Architecture academics Gretchen Wilkins, together with Paul Minifie and Johan van Schaik, Practice Directors of Minifie Nixon, have received a $12,000 grant from the Australia China Council to publish book on water based urban issues in China.

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RMIT ARCHITECTURE ACADEMICS SHORTLISTED FOR INCLUSION IN THE VENICE BIENNALE
Venice Architecture Biennale 2010 Australian Creative Directors, John Gollings and Ivan Rijavec ran a competition to select projects to be exhibited in the "Ideas for Australia’s Cities 2050+" Australian Pavilion exhibition. There were 129 submissions. Of the 24 teams that have been shortlisted, 5 teams have RMIT Architecture academics as members. RMIT affiliated teams include:

Project: Cloud nets
Minifie Nixon Architects + RMIT; Practice Directors: Paul Minifie, RMIT Architecture Associate Professor; Jan van Schaik, RMIT Architecture Lecturer

Project: Implementing the Rhetoric
Harrison and White, Practice Directors: Stuart Harrison, RMIT Architecture Senior Lecturer; Marcus White, RMIT Architecture Lecturer

Project: A Future Australian City
Edmond and Corrigan, Practice Directors: Maggie Edmond & Peter Corrigan, RMIT Professor of Architecture

Project: Sydney 2050 Fraying Ground
Terroir, Practice Directors: Scott Balmforth; Gerard Reinmuth and Prof Richard Blythe, Head of RMIT School of Architecture and Design

Project: Networks- Eco-polis
Whitford and Brearly, Steve Whitford and James Brearly, RMIT Architecture Adjunct Professor

Architecture and Design article announcing 24 shortlisted projects

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Past News

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Compiled by Brent Allpress, RMIT Architecture Research Director
brent.allpress@rmit.edu.au