Pritzker Prize

Pritzker Prize

The Pritzker Architecture Prize has existed since 1979 and awards annually a living architect, initiated by the Hyatt Foundation, the United States of America. Given its importance at the international level is called the "Nobel Prize of Architecture". Álvaro Siza Vieira, awarded in 1992, was the only Portuguese architect to receive the Pritzker.

The Pritzker Prize is intended to distinguish between an architect whose work combines talent, vision and commitment. The winner gets one hundred thousand U.S. dollars and especially international prestige.

Since the first winner, the American Philip Johnson, architects have been distinguished as the Brazilian Oscar Niemeyer, the American Frank Gehry and Thom Mayne, the Dutchman Rem Koolhaas (author of the project Casa da Música in Porto) and has said Alvaro Siza Vieira.

The award was created in 1979 by Jay A. Pritzker and later run by the Pritzker family. This family is linked to the construction of buildings by owning a major international chain of hotels.

Only an architect is distinguished by year. Exceptions occurred in 1988, to celebrate the tenth anniversary of the award (Oscar Niemeyer were consecrated and American Gordon Bunshaft), and in 2001 when they won the Swiss Jacques Herzog and Pierre de Meuron, who worked together.

The Pritzker Prize has its operating model based on the Nobel, the Swedish Academy. The final selection is made by an international jury to vote in secret. In each year there are as a rule, about 500 candidates from 40 countries.

The Hyatt Foundation organized in parallel, an exhibition of architecture, where are shown the work of award-winning architects. The exhibition was first circulated in 1992 by American cities, until in 1995 he left for a trip around the world. The show went through Berlin, Germany, the first waypoint, Austria, and, before returning again in 1998 to tour the United States of America, was in Sao Paulo, Brazil. A new updated version of the exhibition opened in 1999 in Chicago, was published at the same time, a book about the Pritzker Prize.