The American philosopher Donna Haraway and late Italian architect and designer Italo Rota have been respectively awarded the ‘Golden Lion for Lifetime Achievement’ and the ‘Special Golden Lion for Lifetime Achievement in Memoriam’ of the 19th International Architecture Exhibition – La Biennale di Venezia.
Dona Haraway is a distinguished professor emerita in the History of Consciousness Department at the University of California Santa Cruz, where she is an active participant in the Science and Justice Research Center and Center for Cultural Studies. Her work explores the string figures composed by science fact, science fiction, speculative feminism, speculative fabulation, science and technology studies and multispecies worlding. Some of her writings include Staying with the Trouble: Making Kin in the Chthulucene (2016), Primate Visions: Gender, Race, and Nature in the World of Modern Science (1989) and ‘A Cyborg Manifesto’ (1985).
Of his decision to select Haraway for the award, Carlo Ratti, curator of the biennale, stated that ‘Donna Haraway is one of the most influential voices in contemporary thought, straddling the social sciences, anthropology, feminist criticism, and the philosophy of technology’, adding that ‘as designers grapple with a rapidly transforming present in which nature, technology, and society all present symptoms of divergence from the world as we know it, Haraway’s theory empowers us and her observations guide us.’
After obtaining his degree from the Politecnico di Milano, Italo Rota (1953-2024) worked alongside architects Vittorio Gregotti and Franco Albini for several years. He moved to Paris in the early 1980s where he founded his own firm, before settling in Milan in the 1990s. Some of his architecture and design projects include the redesign of the interior of the Musée d’Orsay, the lighting for Notre Dame Cathedral and the banks of the Seine river, the new Noosphere Laboratory Pavilion at the Triennale di Milano and the EXPO Milano 2015 pavilions for Kuwait, Italian Wine and the Arts and Foods Pavilion. He has won several awards including the Gold Medal of Italian Architecture for public spaces, the Gold Medal of Italian Architecture for culture and leisure, the Landmark Conservancy Prize in New York and the Grand Prix de l’Urbanisme in Paris.
Speaking of Rota, Ratti said: ‘Italo Rota was a forerunner. His vision was that of a world in which the relevance of living entities and biology in general, nature in the broadest possible definition, and finally science and applied technology were united in a single breathing entity. Throughout his life, he had the extraordinary ability to traverse the second half of the twentieth century and the first quarter of the new century by flying above the major styles and cultures of design, establishing himself as one of the most original figures in Italian and European architecture.’
Both the awarding ceremony and the inauguration of the International Architecture Exhibition, Intelligens. Natural. Artificial. Collective. will take place on 10 May at Ca’ Giustinian, Venice.
