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Arts

Spanish trio wins Pritzker Architecture Prize

March 1, 2017

Three Catalonia-based architects have been named as the 2017 winners of the prestigious Pritzker Prize. The jury praised the group's ability to create modern works that are deeply rooted in the local landscape.

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The Pritzker Architecture Prize 2017
Prize winners Aranda (L), Pigem (center) and Vilalta (R) are the first trio to win the Pritzker Architecture PrizeImage: The Pritzker Architecture Prize/J. L. Domínguez

Spanish architects Rafael Aranda, Carme Pigem and Ramon Vilalta were announced as the winners of the Pritzker Architecture Prize on Wednesday, making history as the first trio to take home the prize.

Tom Pritzker, the chairman of the Hyatt Foundation which sponsors the prize, said the three architects "have had an impact on the discipline far beyond their immediate area."

"Their ability to intensely relate the environment specific to each site is a testament to their process and deep integrity," he said.

Within Spain, the group's projects include a nursery school, a restaurant, a theater and a winery. Outside of Spain, they have built structures in Belgium and France.

The Pritzker Architecture Prize 2017
The Barberi Laboratory, built in 2008, is located in the trio's hometown in OlotImage: the Pritzker Architecture Prize/H. Suzuki

Pigem, the only woman in the group, said that after the three architects graduated, they decided to return to their hometown in Olot, Spain to start a company. In 1988, the trio founded their firm, RCR Arquitectes in the northeast Catalonian region of Spain.

"We have grown together as architects. We get on very well together. We regard that as our biggest success - staying together," she told the Associated Press by telephone.

The Pritzker Architecture Prize 2017
The tunneling Bell-Lloc Winery is located in Palamos, Spain Image: The Pritzker Architecture Prize/H. Suzuki

Local roots in globalized world

The prize announcement said that in the context of a globalized world, people increasingly fear that "we will lose our local values, our local art and our local customs."

The prize winners "tell us that it may be possible to have both," the statement said.

"They help us to see, in a most beautiful and poetic way, that the answer to the question is not 'either/or' and that we can, at least in architecture, aspire to have both; our roots firmly in place and our arms outstretched to the rest of the world."

The Pritzker Architecture Prize 2017
One of the group's most celebrated buildings is the Soulages Museum in Rodez, FranceImage: The Pritzker Architecture Prize/S. Suzuki

Pritzker Prize winners receive a $100,000 (94,000 euros) grant at an award ceremony that will take place in Tokyo in May.

It is the second time in the prize's 39-year history that the award has gone to Spain, following Rafael Moneo's win in 1996. Other past winners include I.M. Pei, Frank Gehry, Oscar Niemeyer and Norman Foster, Zaha Hadid and Kazuyo Sejima.

A dream home of concrete in Porto

rs/jm (AP, AFP, dpa)