Boston Magazine reporter Alyssa Vaughn spotlights Prof. Azra Aksamija’s design proposal for a piece of public art in Cambridge that would honor the passage of the 19th Amendment. Aksamija’s project “takes the form of a three dimensional palimpsest,” writes Vaughn, “that is visible through an arrangement of concrete elements. These elements are inscribed with names and quotes from notable activists.”
Dean Hashim Sarkis speaks with Washington Post reporter Philip Kennicott about his new book, “The World as an Architectural Project” and the role of architecture in a post-pandemic world. “As architects, we are condemned to optimism,” says Sarkis. “Our field is necessarily about proposing and imaging new things, what the world could be through making a part of it better.”
Professor Emeritus Tunney Lee, an architect and urban planner who served as the chief of planning and design for the Boston Redevelopment Authority, has died at age 88, reports Bryan Marquard for The Boston Globe. “At MIT, Mr. Lee was a mentor to scores of architects, teaching them to look beyond the creativity that went into designing buildings."
Boston Globe reporters Patricia Harris and David Lyon spotlight MIT’s public art collection. “A striking collection of modern sculpture, much of it tucked away in secluded courtyards and grassy quads,” they write. “Large-scale sculpture lives at the nexus of art and architecture,” adding that MIT, “has always been a school of imaginative can-do.”
New York Times reporter Neil Genzlinger memorializes the work of Philip Freelon, an MIT alumnus and well-known architect. Genzlinger writes that Freelon’s “long list of credits includes museums and other cultural institutions devoted to the black experience, among them the National Museum of African American History and Culture on the Mall in Washington.”
MIT alumnus Philip Freelon, a renowned architect known for his work designing the National Museum of African American History and Culture, has died at 66, reports Kelsey Campbell-Dollaghan for Fast Company. Campbell-Dollaghan notes that Freelon was also known for his efforts to make the field of architecture more diverse and inclusive.
Penelope Green of The New York Times highlights the research of Prof. Neri Oxman in this article about air conditioning. “At MIT, Dr. Oxman’s team is experimenting with polymers and bacteria in the hopes they might ‘grow’ building facades, and ‘wearables’ — clothing, for example — complete with arteries to hold cooled liquids or gas,” writes Green.
Boston Globe reporter Sean Smyth spotlights how the work of the late I.M. Pei, a renowned architect and MIT alumnus, can be found throughout the MIT campus and around the world. Smyth notes that Pei’s portfolio included the Green Building at MIT, the Landau Building at MIT, the West Wing addition to the MFA in Boston and the Louvre pyramid in Paris.
MIT alumnus I.M. Pei, “who was widely recognized as the most prominent American architect of his generation,” has died at age 102, reports Robert Campbell for The Boston Globe. Campbell notes that Pei “charted his own course, remaining a canonical modernist and ignoring the fads and revolutions in taste.”
I.M Pei, an MIT graduate and architect known for designing some of the world’s best-known buildings, has died at 102, reports Kathy McCormick and Deepti Hajela for the Associated Press. Pei’s buildings “added elegance to landscapes worldwide with their powerful geometric shapes and grand spaces.”
Wall Street Journal reporter Brenda Cronin spotlights the work of I.M. Pei, an MIT alumnus and renowned architect, who died on May 16. Pei was “an architect whose graceful grids of glass and metal redrew skylines around the world,” writes Cronin.
New York Times reporter Paul Goldberger memorializes the life and work of MIT alumnus I.M. Pei, “one of the most revered architects in the world.” Goldberger writes that Pei, “maintained that he wanted not just to solve problems but also to produce ‘an architecture of ideas.’”
Prof. Brandon Clifford, director and co-founder of Matter Design, has developed a new way to move heavy concrete slabs, using only human force, by exploring ancient building methods, reports Katharine Schwab for Fast Company. “The resulting project, called Walking Assembly, demonstrates the possibilities with a set of interlocking concrete puzzle pieces that the designers are able to assemble into a solid wall and staircase in about 15 minutes,” Schwab explains.
Fast Company reporter Mark Wilson spotlights Prof. Neri Oxman’s work developing 3-D printed sculptures filled with melanin, the pigment that colors our skin and hair. Wilson writes that Oxman’s work shows how melanin could potentially be used in buildings to protect inhabitants for the elements, generate energy or absorb unwanted environmental materials.
In an article for The Washington Post, Beth Simone Noveck highlights RiskMap, an open-source platform developed by researchers from MIT’s Urban Risk Lab that allows users to gather and access information about disaster areas. Noveck writes that “RiskMap is a paradigmatic example of collective intelligence.”