Architect’s Eye Announces Winners of Architectural Photography Contest

The winners of Architect’s Eye, a competition which judges architects’ photography skills, were announced last Wednesday.

The winners were John Barr, an independent architect practicing in Glasgow, and Philippe Brysse, an Associate at Foster and Partners. Runners up were Paul Qi-En Lim, a Part 2 Architectural Assistant at Stride Treglown Limited in Bristol and Antonia Infanger of Antonia Infanger Architecture+ Interiors.

The competition, which attracted more than 200 entries, was open to all qualified architects practicing in the UK and is split into two distinct categories: Architecture and Place and Architecture and People.

John Barr won the Architecture and Place category with his image ‘Church of the Light’. The photograph featured a church in Ibaraki, which is one of Tadao Ando’s earlier works and will be known to many architects. The photograph depicts light flooding thorough a cruciform window in a manner which is immediately striking. George Kavanagh, professional photographer and judge said ” This photograph has is all - drama and narrative with its skillful composition, good use of light and technical competence .”

The winning photograph in the Architecture and People category, by Philippe Brysse was a contrast: an image was taken at a reservoir in North London, featuring a bride and groom on their wedding day. Margaret O’Regan, Art Consultant and judge, said of the piece: “I love the starkness of this photograph and the isolation of the building. The evidence that a wedding has taken place and the parked car outside add some humour and life to an otherwise nondescript piece of architecture. It illustrates the connection between the two. “

A brainchild of International Arts Consultants (IAC), the award is now in its second year. IAC developed the idea for the competition from observing architects’ enthusiasm for photographing buildings. Photography is an important part of all architects’ education and continuing professional development and is taught on most architecture courses in the UK.

The competition was judged by Jack Pringle (Chairman of Pringle Brandon Architects), Keith Priest (Fletcher Priest Architects), Hugh Pearman (Editor of the RIBA Journal and architecture critic for the Sunday Times), leading architectural photographers Grant Smith and George Kavanagh, Nick Scott (Chair of Applied and Professional Panel, Royal Photographic Society), Charles Knevitt ( Director RIBA Trust) Jean-Francois Cardella of Construction Photography and Margaret O’Regan of International Art Consultants.

Commenting on the results of the competition, the Chairman of the Judges Jack Pringle said: “Once again architects have proved that they have an “eye” for a good photograph. This made judging a challenging, but enjoyable task. Despite that, we were in agreement that the two winning photographs were both technically and artistically excellent which, we believe, demonstrates the importance of photography in architecture.”

The competition is organized by International Art Consultants, sponsored by Construction Photography and specialist property marketing consultancy tta Group and supported by the Royal Photographic Society and RIBA Trust.

Given the continued success of the competition, International Art Consultants announced to make it a regular biannual event and will be planning accordingly for 2011. Bustler will keep you updated.