Architecture and Civil Engineering: Year In Review 1996Article
Free Pass Two architects, one Spanish and the other American,
dominated much of the world’s architectural news in 1996. Each
won a prestigious award. José Rafael Moneo received the $100,000
Pritzker Architecture Prize, the world’s most prestigious
architecture honour, and in late 1996 it was announced that
Richard Meier would receive the 1997 Gold Medal of the American
Institute of Architects (AIA). Both prizes were for career
achievement rather than for any one building. Moneo received his
Pritzker at a ceremony in Los Angeles in June, the same month in
which he was chosen to design a new $50 million Roman Catholic
cathedral for that city, intended to replace the structure
damaged in a 1994 earthquake. The proposed demolition of the old
cathedral was stopped by court order, however, after a protest
by historic preservation groups, and at year’s end the outcome
was not clear. Other Moneo buildings under construction in 1996
included a major additi