Spain's Musac Museum, the winner of the 2007 European Union Prize for Contemporary Architecture - Mies van der Rohe Award
The Hungarian Association of Architects, which supports the culture of quality architecture, has set out to start a dialogue between the architects of Europe and Hungary with a series of programmes and events featuring some of the world's most famous contemporary architects.
While the Month of Architects is aimed at the general public, the spring event is intended mainly for professionals. It kicked off on March 7 with the opening of two exhibitions. An exhibition of winners of the European Union Prize for Contemporary Architecture - Mies van der Rohe Award earlier travelled from the Fundació Mies van der Rohe in Barcelona to cities all around Europe before ending its tour in Vienna. This year, the exhibition will make its last stop in Budapest.
The new library in Turku, designed by the Finnish architect Teemu Kurkela
The VTT Digitalo building, designed by the Finnish architect Tuomo Siitonen
The European Union Prize for Contemporary Architecture - Mies van der Rohe Award is presented every two years by the European Union and the Fundació Mies van der Rohe (set up in 1983 with the initial purpose of reconstructing the German Pavilion, designed by Mies van der Rohe for the 1929 Barcelona International Exhibition Barcelona). The prize acknowledges and rewards quality architectural production in Europe. In 2007, 272 architects applied for the prize. Forty were included in the exhibition and two were awarded prizes.
The exhibition was opened in the VAM Design Center by International Union of Architects president Gaétan Siew, and Fundació Mies van der Rohe chairman Lluis Hortes.
The second exhibition, of contemporary Finnish architecture, opened in the evening at the Hungarian Association of Architects' headquarters. The exhibition features the work of two Finnish architecture firms - buildings that are energy-efficient, environmentally-friendly and people-friendly, buildings that are already ahead of the 21st century. The heads of the two firms - Tuomo Siitonen and Teemu Kurkela - will speak at a one-day conference on Saturday. Also speaking will be the Danish architect Louis Becker and the profession's Polish-American star Daniel Libeskind.
