Zaha Hadid
Zaha Hadid, Designer & Architect (1950-2016), Iraq. The first woman to win the prestigious Pritzker Prize for Architecture in its 26 year history. Zaha Hadid is an architect who consistently pushes the boundaries of architecture and urban design. Her work experiments with new spatial concepts intensifying existing urban landscapes in the pursuit of a visionary aesthetic that encompasses all fields of design, ranging from urban scale through to products, interiors and furniture. Best known for her seminal built works (Vitra Fire Station, Land Formation-One, Bergisel Ski Jump, Strasbourg Tram Station and Rosenthal Centre for Contemporary Art in Cincinnati) her central concerns involve a simultaneous engagement in practice, teaching and research. Zaha Hadid's built work has won her much academic and public acclaim. Her best known projects to date are the Vitra Fire Station and the LFone pavilion in Weil am Rhein, Germany (1993/1999), a housing project for IBA-Block 2 in Berlin, Germany (1993), the Mind Zone at the Millennium Dome, Greenwich, London, UK (1999), a Tram Station and Car Park in Strasbourg, France (2001), a Ski Jump in Innsbruck, Austria (2002) and the Contemporary Arts Centre, Cincinnati, US (2003). She has also completed furniture and interiors: Bitar, London (1985); Moonsoon Restaurant, Sapporo (1990); Z-Play (2002) and Z-Scape (2000) furniture manufactured by Sawaya and Moroni; and the Tea and Coffee Towers for Alessi (2003). Her temporary structures include: Folly in Osaka (1990); Music Video Pavilion in Groningen, Netherlands (1990); a Pavilion for Blueprint Magazine at Interbuild, Birmingham (1995); the installation Meshworks at the Villa Medici, Rome, Italy (2000) the summer pavilion for the Serpentine Gallery, London, UK (2000); and the R. Lopez de Heredia Vina Tondonia Pavilion, Barcelona, Spain (2001); and a snow and ice installation at the Snow Show, Lapland (2004). Zaha Hadid has also worked on a number of stage sets: Pet Shop Boys World Tour (1999/2000); Metapolis, for Charleroi Dance production company, Belgium (2000); and Beat Furrer's opera, Desire, commissioned by the Steirischer Herbst, Graz (2003). |
