The World Architecture Festival, with co-curators Make Architects and the Sir John Soane’s Museum, announced today the winners of their annual Architecture Drawing Prize, established in 2017 to recognize the “continuing importance of hand drawing, whilst also embracing the creative use of digitally produced renderings.”
Top honors this year go to Li Han for his work entitled "The Samsara of Building No.42 on Dirty Street." The drawing depicts a chronological visual narrative of the a residential development in Beijing, stretching from 2008 to 2017. Over the decade the block developed from typical apartments to an mixed commercial and residential development - only to be torn down by the Chinese government and restored to a dedicated residential program.
The drawing, while outstanding for its graphic quality, also challenges the typical capacity of drawing itself through its compression of time and narrative. Jury member Narinder Sagoo, senior partner at Foster + Partners, cited the drawing's ability to tell..."hundreds of stories over nine years in which architecture, cities and people's lives change. It's important for all architects to consider the life of buildings over the course of time... It's a modern day Archigram drawing but also a step into the future, which is why it's an overall winner."
