UIA: The Latest Architecture and News

Rio de Janeiro has been selected to host World Congress of Architects UIA 2020, one of the world's most important architecture forums. The news was announced yesterday by one of the UIA's former presidents and current Secretary of the Session, Vassils Sgoutas, during the General Assembly of this year’s congress in Durban, South Africa. Rio's application was spearheaded by Brazil's most important architecture institution - Instituto de Arquitetos do Brasil (IAB). The South American city beat out two strong candidates: Melbourne and Paris.

After the presentations of the three candidate cities, two rounds of voting began. In the first round Rio got 85 votes, against Melbourne’s 73 votes and Paris’ 44 votes. In the second round Rio beat Melbourne with 107 votes against 95. 

The Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA) has dropped their controversial proposal to ban the Israeli Association of United Architects (IAUA) from the umbrella organization the International Union of Architects (UIA). Intended as a sanction against the IAUA for failing to "resist projects on illegally-occupied land," supporters of the proposal had hoped it would be discussed at the UIA World Congress in Durban in August, however the UIA has confirmed that it will not include the motion as it is beyond their 'political scope'.

In response to the highly controversial episode - which garnered criticism both in the UK and as far afield as the United States - the RIBA has announced a new working group that will "consider the institute’s role in engaging with communities facing civil conflict and natural disaster."

More on the decision by the UIA and the new RIBA Ethics Group after the break

The International Union of Architects (UIA) has announced that it will award its Gold Medal to the Chinese born American architect and 1983 Pritzker Laureate, Ieoh Ming Pei.

By bestowing the most prestigious of the UIA's awards on Pei, whose “life and work spans the history of modern architecture over five continents for more than sixty years," the UIA recognizes "his unique style, his timeless rigor, and his spiritual connection to history, time and space.”

Pei will receive the UIA Gold Medal at the awards ceremony at the UIA World Congress of Architecture in Durban, South Africa on August 6th 2014.

The New York chapter of the AIA has officially voiced its objection to a proposal by the RIBA to suspend the Israeli Association of United Architects (IAUA) from the International Union of Architects (UIA). A letter drafted by AIANY President Lance Jay Brown and Chief Executive Rick Bell, and unanimously approved by AIANY's board of directors, states that "the UIA's stated goal is to unite the architects of the world without any form of discrimination", and refers to the proposal to suspend the IAUA as "directly antithetical to the purpose of the much appreciated umbrella organization".

The original proposal by the RIBA, adopted on March 19th, condemns the IAUA for its failure to "resist projects on illegally-occupied land" in the West Bank and Gaza, and calls on the UIA to suspend the body until it "acts to resist these illegal projects, and observes international law, and the UIA Accords and Resolution 13."

Read on for more on the controversial backstory to the RIBA's motion