“Over the past three days, I’ve received a lot of comments about the imagination and creativity shown by this convention,” said AIA President Douglas L Steidl, FAIA, as he opened the final general session of the AIA National Convention on May 21. “If I could take credit for what’s happened here, it would only be for choosing the team that made this convention happen.” He called to the stage the key team players—National Chair Brad Simmons, AIA; AIA Las Vegas Convention Committee Chair Brad Schultz, FAIA; Continuing Education Advisory Committee Chair Daniel Friedman, FAIA; and AIA Las Vegas Executive Director Randy Lavigne—who were acknowledged by the audience with rousing applause.

Steidl then was joined by AIA Executive Vice President/CEO Norman L. Koonce, FAIA, to present this year’s AIA Presidential Medal to five of this year’s six recipients. The medal honors leaders of international architecture societies.

This year’s recipients are: Yolanda D. Reyes, Architects Regional Council of Asia (ARCASIA); José Manuel Reachi Mora, Federacion de Colegios de Arquitectos de la Republica Mexicana (FCARM); Gabriel Durand-Hollis, FAIA, Federacion Panamericana de Asociaciones de Arquitectos (FPAA); Yves Gosselin, MIRAC, Royal Architectural Institute of Canada (RAIC); Robert Nation, FRAIA, Royal Australian Institute of Architects (RAIA); and Marie-Hélène Lucas, Architects’ Council of Europe (ACE) (who was not present).

Honors and admiration for EVP Koonce
Steidl then reminded the audience that Koonce, who has served the Institute as EVP/CEO since 1999, will be retiring at the end of the year. The assemblage paid homage to the AIA’s outgoing executive with a presidential citation and a scholarship established in his name at Louisiana State University, his alma mater (see related story).

Norbert Young receives Kemper Award
Steidl then turned his attention to presentation of the Edward C. Kemper Award, named in honor of the first executive director of the Institute and bestowed on an architect member who has contributed significantly to the profession through service to the Institute. “This year’s distinguished recipient has been instrumental in furthering the growth of the design and construction industry through education. As an Architecture Construction and Engineering (ACE) Mentor Board and Executive Committee member, he has helped shape this not-for-profit organization with its focus on making high school students aware of the opportunities for future careers in the design and construction field,” Steidl said. “Please join me in welcoming to this stage the president of McGraw-Hill Construction and the 2005 recipient of the Edward C. Kemper Award, Norbert W. Young Jr., FAIA.”

“Thank you very, very much Doug, and thank you, AIA,” Young said. “This is a great honor! It’s also humbling, humbling to be included among previous recipients who are among my personal heroes—Norman Koonce, Jim Scheeler, and Harold Adams. This makes me even more proud to be an architect and a member of the AIA.” Young said that his first real awakening to what architect is about came in graduate school at the University of Pennsylvania, where he learned what an architect could and should be. Among his many influences were Lou Kahn, Ian McHarg, Ed Bacon, Dean Perkins, and teachers like Mario Romanach and John Bower. He singled out his wife Christine as “the absolute key to who I am today and whatever I might have achieved.”

Young also stressed that the architecture, engineering, and construction industry, despite its size and importance, can be inefficient and frustrating in the way that it connects to its partners in the industry, our clients, and even with one another. “So I am constantly driving my own organization and all of you, my fellow architects, to get better connected,” he said. “Understand when to lead, when to follow, and when to listen. This is important not only because it’s the right thing to do. It’s important because I truly believe the power of architecture uniquely qualifies us to be leaders.

AAF strategic growth plan
In his role as newly elected chair of the American Architectural Foundation’s Board of Regents, Young introduced AAF President Ron Bogle, who talked about the foundation’s ambitious strategic growth plan, which includes:

• Expanding the Mayors’ Institute on City Design with themed sessions
• Convening a National Summit on School Design in the fall
• Teaming up with the Chicago Architecture Foundation to develop a national K–12 design education program
• Reshaping the scholarship program to increase dramatically the annual funding for students of color to pursue undergraduate degrees in architecture and extending the program to fund the full four or five years of the program
• Creating the International Vision Awards to allow young architects to travel internationally to developing countries for volunteer service.

“If you’d like to learn more about us, please feel free to give us a call or check us out on the Web,” Bogle concluded. “We’ve got a lot going on and we’d love to hear from you!”

Calatrava’s magic
Before moving to the featured presentation, Steidl called for a moment of silence to acknowledge the passing of two giants of our profession: Gold Medal recipients Fay Jones and Philip Johnson. He then invited Architectural Record Editor in Chief Robert A. Ivy, FAIA, to introduce 2005 AIA Gold Medalist Santiago Calatrava, FAIA. “When does writing become poetry?” Ivy asked. “Well, we know it when we see it. And how does building become architecture? With this year’s Gold Medal recipient, we know it when we see it.” Ivy believes that at the core, Calatrava is a humanist in the best sense of the word. “He celebrates what it means to be human . . . Through his special vision, he honors who we are.”

Calatrava gave the group gathered a phenomenal finale to take home with them. Responding to the thunderous standing ovation with which the crowd greeted him, Calatrava told the audience, “It is an honor for me to stand here before you, and the greatest honor to have received the Gold Medal.” He set forth to offer some understanding of the defining elements of his architecture using a “city of images” in the form of slides, a video, and an imaging device that allowed him to draw and paint while having the image projected to the audience directly on large-screen monitors. (See related story.)

Approaching the 150 milestone
We’ve discovered in the past few days, Las Vegas still has lessons to teach, Steidl said. “No other American city raises quite so boldly the design issues of our time—population growth, land use, resource management, energy, infrastructure, transportation, crime, affordable housing, and the transformation of the economy of the center city, from manufacturing to entertainment and service. It’s all here.”

The AIA president said that he hoped that as we prepare to celebrate the AIA’s 150th anniversary in 2007, this has set the stage for how we observe this milestone among ourselves and with the members of our communities. “My hope is that we will take away from this convention an enhanced appreciation not simply of the power of architecture, but of the power of architecture for the good,” Steidl concluded. “If this week works such transformational magic on our hearts and minds, Las Vegas will truly have been not only the biggest AIA convention, but one of the best.”

—SS

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