<span style="color: rgb(153, 153, 153); font-style: italic;">"For myself</span><span style="font-style: italic;">, <span style="font-weight: bold;">being an artisan or a craftsman is an amateur</span> </span><span style="color: rgb(153, 153, 153); font-style: italic;">or almost the same thing."</span><br /><span style="font-style: italic; color: rgb(153, 153, 153);"><br />"His <span style="color: rgb(102, 0, 0);font-size:130%;" ><span style="font-weight: bold;">buildings have the unique ability to evoke </span></span><span style="font-weight: bold; color: rgb(102, 0, 0);font-size:130%;" >the past</span>,</span><span style="font-style: italic; color: rgb(153, 153, 153);"> without making direct references to history. "</span><br /><br /><span style="color: rgb(51, 51, 51); font-style: italic;">Pritzker Prize 2012 : Wang Shu</span><br /><br /><br /><a href="http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7059/6789352080_6676d9663a_b.jpg"><img alt="" border="0" src="http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7059/6789352080_6676d9663a_b.jpg" style="display: block; margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 700px; height: 466px;" /></a><a href="http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7200/6790168920_0c9ac4d960_b.jpg"><img alt="" border="0" src="http://farm8.staticflickr.com/7200/6790168920_0c9ac4d960_b.jpg" style="display: block; margin: 0px auto 10px; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 701px; height: 466px;" /></a><div style="text-align: center;"><span style="font-style: italic; color: rgb(153, 153, 153);"><br />New Academy of Art in Hangzhou / Wang Shu, </span><br /><span style="font-style: italic; color: rgb(153, 153, 153);">Amateur Architecture Studio, photo by Iwan Baan</span><br /><span style="font-style: italic; color: rgb(204, 204, 204);">(lower image, faded, upside down)</span><br /><br style="font-style: italic; color: rgb(153, 153, 153);"></div><span style="font-size:130%;"><a href="http://www.chinese-architects.com/en/amateur/en/"><br /></a><br /><a href="http://www.chinese-architects.com/en/amateur/en/"><span style="font-weight: bold;">Amateur Architecture Studio</span></a></span><br /><br /><br />"<span style="font-style: italic; color: rgb(0, 51, 51);font-size:130%;" ><span style="font-weight: bold;">I design a house instead of a building.</span></span> The house is the amateur architecture approach to the infinitely spontaneous order. Built spontaneously, illegally and temporarily, amateur architecture is equal to professional architecture. But amateur architecture is just not significant."<br /><br />One problem of professional architecture is, that it thinks too much of a building. <span style="font-style: italic; color: rgb(51, 0, 0);font-size:130%;" ><span style="font-weight: bold;">A house, which is close to our simple and trivial life, is more fundamental than architecture.</span></span> Before becoming an architect, I was only a literati. Architecture is part time work to me. For one place, humanity is more important than architecture while simple handicraft is more important than technology." <span style="font-style: italic; color: rgb(153, 153, 153);">(text taken from here)</span><br style="font-style: italic;"><br />The attitude of amateur architecture, - though first of all being an attitude towards a critical experimental building process -, can have more entire and fundamental meaning than professional architecture. <span style="font-style: italic;font-size:130%;" ><span style="font-weight: bold;">For me, any building activity without comprehensive thoughtfulness will be insignificant.</span></span><br /><br /><br /><a href="http://archrecord.construction.com/news/2012/02/Wang-Shu-Wins-2012-Pritzker-Prize.asp"><span style="font-style: italic;">more here</span></a><br /><br style="color: rgb(255, 255, 255);"><span style="color: rgb(255, 255, 255);">------</span>

"For myself , being an artisan or a craftsman is an amateur or almost the same thing." "His buildings have the unique abil...

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