Event 2008.12 Acceptance Speech
From Architect HSIEH and Atelier-3
Chinese Architecural Media Award Acceptance Speech
There are tens of millions of farmers in Sichuan earthquake area, to give play to their creativity, and to combine their labor input into the reconstruction is the key to success, this we do not doubt. But there is a habitual response that the rebuilding process should seek to the industrialized mass production and lower cost, in order to build cheap houses rapidly. However, have we ever thought of, such habitual means and ways will result in the creativity of farmers denied, and their labor excluded.
Most of the Traditional ChuanDou-style wooden houses in the quake area remain intact, with only minor damages to the wall; even if the wall tilt,it does not cause threat to human life. On the contrary, the brick and concrete houses, the symbol of modernization and progress, the one that the poor farmers have accumulated a lifetime savings to build, were shattered on a single blow.
ChuanDou-style wooden structure is the most widely used building system for thousands of years. Its main structure is simple, yet the principle has been applied to various building styles over the years, and the architectural languages inspired by are ever changing.
Our major challenge now, under the changes in objective conditions, is to set up an open building system that’s similar to ChuanDou-style, yet take into account the sustainable issues such as seismic, energy-saving, emission reduction, community participation, and also the economics, and the rapid reconstruction programs.
To a large extent, there are 900 million farmers in China, accounting for 70 percent of the population. What is happening to their architecture today as they head towards progress and modernization? Consider further, that architectural matters of majority of people have nothing to do with us, the architectural expertise. Why is it that the professional involvements are unable to enter this field? It is no doubt a hypocritical escape if we bring this topic to the higher degree of moral talks now, causing by the fear of looking into current architectural concept and confronting the so called modernization.
The other day, my colleagues at the factory got very nervous founding that few order forms for building materials from unexpected sources had jumped the queue. That the pirate version of the light-weight steel housing structure we invented has appeared. I consoled them with the thought that this means our practice has passed the market test, accepted by the public.
Please share with me the heartening chant of Qiang brothers as they set up their house frame. http://video.google.com/videoplay?docid=-2891588737232331213
I would like to thank the organizer and friends that support our team, especially the Autodesk software and its financial fund.
Thank you.
