Tasmania’s unique MONA (Museum of Old and New Art) by Fender Katsalidis has been awarded the Australian Institute of Architects’ most coveted National Architecture Award for 2012.
The project was given the Sir Zelman Cowen Award for Public Architecture, the first time in the Awards’ 31 year history that a Tasmanian project has received award which is considered the Institute’s highest honour for a project.
The Sir Zelman Cowen Award for Public Architecture: MONA – Museum of Old and New Art by Fender Katsalidis. Image by Leigh Carmichael.
In all, 33 projects were recognised at the 2012 Awards, which were held in the Midland Railway Workshops in Perth.
The jury called MONA a “powerful and entertaining experience for displaying and engaging with art that theatrically delivers visitors to a sandstone-walled space within a steel container that is already weathering inexorably into the landscape – creating one of the best examples in the country of the benefits of cultural tourism”.
“A lodging of pure poetry that harmonises completely with its rural setting’ was honoured with The Robin Boyd Award for Residential Architecture – Houses. The Shearer’s Quarters by John Wardle Architects ‘provides accommodation for travelling shearers as well as rural contractors and JWA staff and has a wonderful sense of spirit, tactility and purpose’.
The Robin Boyd Award for Residential Architecture – Houses: The Shearer’s Quarters by John Wardle Architects. Image by Trevor Mein.
Key award winners include:
- The Sir Zelman Cowen Award for Public Architecture – MONA – Museum of Old and New Art by Fender Katsalidis (TAS).
- The Robin Boyd Award for Residential Architecture – Houses – The Shearer’s Quarters by John Wardle Architects (TAS).
- The Fredrick Romberg Award for Residential Architecture – Multiple Housing – Monash University Student Housing, Clayton by BVN Architecture (VIC).
- The Harry Seidler Award for Commercial Architecture – 1 Bligh Street, Sydney by architectus + ingenhoven architects (NSW).
- The Lachlan Macquarie Award for Heritage – Restoration of Swifts, Darling Point by Clive Lucas Stapleton & Partners (NSW).
- The Emil Sodersten Award for Interior Architecture – The John Kaldor Family Gallery – Art Gallery of New South Wales by PTW Architects (NSW).
- The Walter Burley Griffin Award for Urban Design – University Lawn Precinct RMIT University by Peter Elliott Architecture + Urban Design (VIC).
- The National Enduring Architecture Award – Australia Square by Harry Seidler & Associates (NSW).
- The Jørn Utzon Award for International Architecture – Auckland Art Gallery Toi o Tāmaki by FMJT + Archimedia (architects in association).
- The Colorbond Award for Steel Architecture – Milson Island Sports Stadium by Allen Jack + Cottier Architects (NSW).