Golden Lion to Paulo Mendes da Rocha

Per a statement from la Biennale di Venezia, the decision to give the Golden Lion to the 2006 laureate of the Pritzker Architecture Prize (ten years before Aravena's prize) was motivated by his architecture's "Timelessness":

Many  decades  after  being  built,  each of his  projects have resisted  the test  of  time,  both  stylistically  and physically. This astonishing  consistency  may  be  the  consequence  of  his  ideological  integrity  and  his  structural  genius.  He  is  a  nonconformist  challenger  and  simultaneously a passionate realist. His fields of interest are beyond architecture, in political, social, geographical, historical and technical realms. The role model he played for many generations of architects in Brazil, Latin America and everywhere is that of a person able to join shared and collective efforts as well as someone able to attract others to the cause of a better built environment.

Paulo Mendes da Rocha, who will turn 88 in October, will receive the Golden Lion for Lifetime Achievement on Saturday May 28th at Ca’ Giustinian, the headquarters of La Biennale di Venezia, during the awards ceremony and inauguration of the 15th Exhibition, which will open to the public at 10:00 am on that same day.