The FA ČVUT Award 2007/2008

After the recent presentation of the results of the student work competition at the Faculty of Architecture of the Technical University in Liberec "Ještěd f kleci", archiweb.cz brings the results of works by students from another Czech school of architecture for comparison. At the Faculty of Architecture of the Czech Technical University in Prague, two student competitions compete each year – I dare say much more well-known and also more widely participated Olověný Dušan, organized by the Association of Architecture Students (this year's winner will be announced on March 18) and somewhat in the background, without larger media coverage and unfortunately also (judging by the number of entries) students' excitement, the competition For the FA CTU Award. It is organized by the dean of the faculty.
Does the competition, in which only a fraction of the students participate, have informative character? And if so, what message does it bring about the school? Judge for yourselves.

RESULTS
1st prize not awarded.
Category Architecture:
1st prize – Martin Prokš, 6th year (studio of Petr Hájek and Jan Šépka), Gallery and Bus Station
2nd prize – Jitka Molnárová, 4th semester (studio of Jan Aulík), Újezd, Museum of Communism
3rd prize – Monika Prostředníková, 3rd year (studio of Ján Stempel), Family Houses in Prague 3
Category Urbanism:
1st prize not awarded.
2nd prize – Dominik Aleš, 4th year (studio of Patrik Kotase), Prague-Bubny
3rd prize – Lenka Prokopová, 4th year (studio of Vladimír Krátký), Smíchov Urbanism

JURY
Markéta Cajthamlová (chair), Richard Doležal, Jan Hájek, Radek Kolařík (FA CTU), Eduard Schleger (FA CTU).
A total of 10 competitors entered in the architecture category and 6 competitors in the urbanism category.

QUESTIONS FOR THE JURY
(passage taken from the Bulletin of the Faculty of Architecture ALFA 2/’09, author Jiří Horský)

1a/ The winning work reminds us – among other things – of current topics related to Czech and Moravian cities, associated with densification of construction in the built-up area. Does the selected solution (the location of an art gallery above the spacious station, situated in the urban ground floor) reflect the real state of Czech society?
1b/ What do you see as the positives and negatives of the solution?
1c/ Or is it more of a vision, a prefiguration of society, "how it should be"?

2/ Does the winning work, with its emphasis on the visual expression of the gallery, raise the question of architecture as "the art of building," as a "competitor" to the exhibited artifacts of fine art?

Markéta Cajthamlová
1a/ The situation of the urban bus station – in the sense of understanding "transport" as a basic means of communication (where the gallery as a superstructure of today’s communication of the world is above it), seems very appropriate to me.
1b/ The solution offers residents of the city very easy access to art – on the way – in the street, in a container form, but on the other hand further diminishes the old forgotten values such as institutions, authority…
1c/ I don’t know how society should be, but if it functioned like in NYC, where it is always artists and galleries that change the image of the city, then it is the right direction.

2/ In this case, I do not see the building as a competitor at all; the interior space is a completely banal white box lit from above, there is nothing more neutral, and if it wants to present itself outwardly as another exhibition space of the city, why not?

Richard Doležal
1a/ If the question means whether bus travelers are joyfully eager to visit the gallery before departure or after arrival of their connection, or that they will at least do so since they are already there, the answer is: "definitely not."
If it is meant that someone in our society will catch any, even very cheap gag, then it reflects.
And if you are asking whether the design expresses how much our society values art, then definitely yes. It reflects.
1b/ I understood the author's concept as a pile of "containers for art on little legs." The idea of its realization is completely unacceptable to my taste. Of course, there are places around the world that evoke a very positive atmosphere similar to the presented design, great for showcasing avant-garde art. It could be some commercial harbor, they are industrial buildings that have ceased to serve their original purpose, abandoned warehouses... They carry the patina of motor oil smell, battered trapezoidal sheet metal, and a certain degree of clutter everywhere you step. However, unlike the author's design, these places are "real," they are not new constructions in the middle of the city! And even if the author managed to artificially create the same atmosphere, meaning to fake it, the question is whether that is what society longs for?
1c/ I hope that I will not witness such a society.

2/ Yes!

Jan Hájek
1a/ I think it is more a vision of the society we would like to have. The real state of our society is, in my opinion, rather characterized by emptiness, emptiness defined by the project of the protected bus station on the ground floor, the cold relationship of Czechs and Moravians to international art exhibitions like Documenta, gallery fairs like Art Fair. The idealism of the selected project is therefore even more sympathetic to me.
1b/ I see the positive in the simplicity of the form. I don’t quite understand preserving the space of the bus station at ground level. The construction of a giant gallery is an optimistic vision of the future; I perceive the bus station more as a burden of the Soviet past. If the project could solve the freeing of the ground floor through a good organization of transport, as is addressed in developed world metropolises, the gallery building could gain, for example, its own internal environment, a storage space in the basements... and the city perhaps a garden...
1c/ As for the gallery, I hope it cannot be understood any other way. As for the bus station, I hope not.

2/ That is always a problem. And it’s not just about building the artifact, but also about the system. It is certainly good when an architect realizes the possibility that in the beautifully designed building of a giant gallery with golden handles, a curator will work for 12,000 a month, without the means to acquire complete collections.

Radek Kolařík, Institute of Urbanism FA CTU
1a/ I do not think so. Because I do not believe that was the author's intention and goal of the concept. It is simply a well-thought-out design based on sound judgment. A high-quality summary of reflections on the program, place, city, time.
1b/ Precisely in that.
1c/ It is a cultivated design, documenting the author's maturity and balance. A manifestation of feeling and cultivated reason. Without inappropriate ambitions.

2/ I also do not think so about the winning design. It uses an approach that has already been tested. Informedly. Appropriately, personally, intelligently applies it. The form expresses the content in a way that would ensure the autonomy and sovereignty of the exhibited works.

Eduard Schleger, Institute II, FA CTU
I do not wish to comment on the first question, as it is the responsibility of the studio leader to determine whether the work met the requirements of the specific assignment in all parameters and, above all, which parameters of the assignment were binding.
Otherwise, purely academically speaking to question no. 2, when was the gate of architectural art opened wide as a competitor to the exhibited artifacts?, was it already in antiquity or only in Bilbao? Isn’t it more about how?