Official & General News

Thursday 28 April 2011

The First Book on Muzharul Islam's Works Published Followed by an Exhibition

on Thursday 28 April 2011 - 20:20:34 | by admin
Nurur Rahman Khan presenting Muzharul Islam's book to Shamsul Wares

Muzharul Islam is the pioneer architect of Bangladesh and honored as the guru of modern architecture in this region. Although it's our long bad legacy of doing almost nothing about architectural publication in the country, resulting even at least a single book on this master architect was also not there. Someone had to come up and do the due job. Muzharul Islam is now 87, and his physical and mental health is rapidly deteriorating. We are supposed to do something (actually more!) before he leaves us!

A bunch of enthusiastic and passionate fellows recently cobbled up a book on his selected drawings.
Today (28th April, 2011) the book has been opened at the Dhaka Art Center entitled 'Muzharul Islam: Selected Drawings', Authored by Nurur Rahman Khan, published under the banner of Sthapotto-o-Nirman.
Shakil Mahmood helped in photographs and scanning the drawings, the graphics and composition of the book is done by ArchSociety founder Mohammad Tauheed and Sabbir Ahmed, Deanna Alam sorted and compiled the photos in the book.

Architect Nurur Rahman Khan is the devoted enthusiast who initiated the works of making a digital and hard-copy archive of Muzharul Islam's remarkable works in 2005 and thus the Muzharul Islam Archive was created. The Archive is physically hosted in The University of Asia Pacific's Department of Architecture, anyone can visit the archive, browse through high resolution scans of the drawings, read texts and also can see the original copies of the works. See the website of Muzharul Islam Archive:
http://www.muzharulislam.com
And he also spent considerable amount of time for collecting and compiling all the works, all the texts wherever published about Muzharul Islam from long, and he is still on it.

A small event is hosted today for the opening of the book and an exhibition has also been opened at the Dhaka Art Center, compiling some breathtaking original drawings of Muzharul Islam. The exhibition will run 3 more days.
If someone is sniffing around with a dissatisfied look on their face about where to find a good piece of work, must see this exhibition. This is called architecture, what Mr. Islam did, go and see yourself.

Nurur Rahman Khan presenting The Audience at Muzharul Islam's book opening

The exhibition on Muzharul Islam's original drawings

Wednesday 30 March 2011

Portuguese maestro Eduardo Souto de Moura wins Pritzker Prize 2011

on Wednesday 30 March 2011 - 12:31:31 | by admin


The biggest architecture prize of the year the Pritzker Prize 2011 has been declared on 28th March. Eduardo Souto de Moura, a 58 year old architect from Portugal, is the jury’s choice for the 2011 Pritzker Architecture Prize, it was announced today by Thomas J. Pritzker, chairman of The Hyatt Foundation which sponsors the prize. The formal ceremony for what has come to be known throughout the world as architecture’s highest honor will be in one of Washington, D.C.’s finest classical buildings, the Andrew W. Mellon Auditorium on June 2nd.

As a student, Souto de Moura worked for Alvaro Siza for five years. Since forming his own office in 1980, Souto de Moura has completed well over sixty projects, most in his native Portugal, but he has designs in Spain, Italy, Germany, United Kingdom and Switzerland. The projects include single family homes, a cinema, shopping centers, hotels, apartments, offices, art galleries and museums, schools, sports facilities and subways.


Braga Stadium, Braga, Portugal (Photo: Luis Ferreira Alves)

His stadium in Braga, Portugal was the site of European soccer championships when it was completed in 2004, and gained high praise. Nearly a million and a half cubic yards of granite were blasted from the site and crushed to make concrete for the stadium. Precise explosions of a mountain side created a hundred foot high granite face that terminates one end of the stadium. Souto de Moura describes this coexistence of the natural with the man made construction as good architecture. In his own words, “It was a drama to break down the mountain and make concrete from the stone.” The jury citation calls this work, “...muscular, monumental and very much at home within its powerful landscape.”


Burgo Tower, Porto, Portugal (Photo: Luis Ferreira Alves)

Another of his projects, the Burgo Tower, completed in 2007, constructed in the city where he lives and works, Porto, Portugal, is described by the jury as, “...two buildings side by side, one vertical and one horizontal with different scales, in dialogue with each other and the
urban landscape.” Souto de Moura commented that “a twenty story office tower is an unusual
project for me. I began my career building single family houses.”

To know more about Pritzker Architecture Prize and the laurite visit the official Pritzker website: http://www.pritzkerprize.com/

Friday 18 March 2011

Need 16 volunteers for a Dhaka Traffic survey work

on Friday 18 March 2011 - 13:38:16 | by NEO
Hi all around Dhaka city,

A small survey project on Dhaka's traffic is being organized this week. We need 16 volunteers to work on 4 traffic nodes in Dhaka City. 4 on each nodes. The work starts from Tuesday, March 22nd ends on Thursday, March 24th, full-time (8 hours).

Volunteers' travel cost (within Dhaka) and food will be provided.
Anyone who has academic or practical experience of urban survey is encouraged to join. Senior students in architecture, urban design, sociology is preferred.

Intense working experience and fun is guaranteed. Hop in!
Send your contact details and short description of where do you work or study within 21st March to this email address if you are interested to work:
mailATarchsociety.com

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