The Dušan Jurkovič Award was won by Cigler&Marani from Prague

The Dušan Jurkovič Award is the oldest and most prestigious Slovak award for architecture. This year, it was awarded for the 45th time, and the winner was the Digital Park project on Einstein Street in Bratislava-Petržalka, designed by architects Jakub Cigler, Vincent Marani, Petr Kužela, Ondřej Hrozinka, Tomáš Bíma, and Jan Hofman from the Cigler&Marani architectural office in Prague.
      The ceremonial award presentation took place on Monday, November 23, 2009, in the Mirror Hall of the Primatial Palace in Bratislava. The award was presented to the winners and nominated architects by the president of the Slovak Association of Architects, Ján Bahna, the chairman of the Fund for Fine Arts, Peter Brtko, and the chairman of the international jury, Peter Gero from Germany.

      This year, the international jury of the Dušan Jurkovič Award competition evaluated 26 submitted architectural projects. Besides the main award, the jury also granted nominations to three works:

• Administrative and Production Hall ETIS in Bratislava, author Andrej Alexy
• Apartment Building Kačica in Banská Bystrica, authors Ladislav Bradiak, Roman Jariabka, Marian Sotník
• Renovation of the Roman Catholic Church of the Annunciation of the Lord, Nová Lesná, author Tomáš Bujna

In addition to the Dušan Jurkovič Award, two other annual awards were presented in the Mirror Hall by SAS: the Emil Belluš Award for Lifetime Achievement, which was awarded to architect Josef Struhař (designer of the STV building in Mlynska Dolina, the Astronomical Institute, and other SAV facilities in the High Tatras, the Dexia Bank building on Obchodná Street in Bratislava, etc.), and the Martin Kusý Award for Scientific and Theoretical Activity and Popularization of Architecture. The laureates were filmmaker and director Ladislav Kaboš for the documentary "Modern Architecture in Slovakia" and Prof. Štefan Šlachta for his contributions to the historiography of Slovak architecture (an exhibition about the architect Ladislav Hudec, rediscovered by Šlachta, is currently underway at the Slovak National Museum; Hudec worked in Shanghai).
      This year's annual SAS awards took on a Czechoslovak dimension, as the Dušan Jurkovič Award went to a Prague team for a Bratislava project, and the Emil Belluš Award went to an architect from the Moravian-Slovak border region (Štítné nad Vláří), who worked for many years at the Czechoslovak state design institute for communications, Spojprojekt.
 

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The Dušan Jurkovič Award exhibition, showcasing all 26 submitted works, is taking place from November 19 to December 12, 2009, at the SAS Gallery on Panská Street 15 in Bratislava.
From December 16, 2009, an exhibition by architect Josef Struhař, laureate of the Emil Belluš Award 2009, will be installed in the same spaces. Catalogs for both exhibitions can be purchased at the SAS Gallery.