EDMONTON ART GALLERY.....one of these will be it...

Alsop

http://www.edmontonartgallery.com/images/subimages/Building_OCAD.jpg

Hadid

http://www.edmontonartgallery.com/images/subimages/Building_Hadid.jpg

Stout

http://www.edmontonartgallery.com/images/subimages/Building_HunterMuseum.jpg

Erickson

http://www.edmontonartgallery.com/images/subimages/Building_MofGlass.jpg

here are larger ones

http://www.geneseeab.com/PROMOTE-Edmonton/art_gallery_images/alsop.gif

http://www.geneseeab.com/PROMOTE-Edmonton/art_gallery_images/erickson.gif

http://www.geneseeab.com/PROMOTE-Edmonton/art_gallery_images/hadid.gif

http://www.geneseeab.com/PROMOTE-Edmonton/art_gallery_images/stout.gif

Erickson
I hope , the first looks , just to far out there for me and a little hippie like ...

i don't know which one i'd pick but i know i would NOT pick the one that looks like an old Polaroid Camera........WTF??????

Erickson

Well they are all good for one thing. Total change in architecture. I personally think Stout gets my vote followed closely by Alsop.

Stout

i've been to edmonton many times before and have family and close friends there... and i believe that edmonton deserves a complete original... therefore... i will say that the Alsop design is the best for it. I've seen what he can do first hand here in Toronto for OCAD and it is one of the most originals here... perfect for an art school, and this advanced design for edmonton's art gallery is even better. The erickson one and the stout one look too much like minatures of the AGO expasion/renovation and therefore do not appeal to me much. But whichever design the judges decide i'm sure it will be a great improvement for edmonton.. which is much deserved.

yea, Alsop has grown on me. Although I still like Stout's, but there is something about Alsop that is drawing me to it.

I was at first thinking Stout...but I would definitely go with Alsop. It stands out well and is quite original.

I was also drawn to Stout at first, then Alsop grew on me. I would love to see Alsop's in the skyline.

http://members.shaw.ca/mock/alsopsky.jpg

Well you may be happy to know that it appears the Alsop design has won! I for one am happy about this choice.

YES! I KNEW EDMONTON WOULD MAKE THE RIGHT CHOICE!!! hahaha.. i'm really happy about this! almost as happy as when brookfield announced a 243m office/condo where the Bay Adelaide Centre was in Toronto..>.<'' WAIT! this is better since its culture... GOOD JOB EDMONTON! i'll come and visit when that is done!

Ladies and gents!
The winner is (drum roll SFX)....STOUT!

And it will be renamed the Art Gallery of Alberta!

Choice of L.A. architect to be announced today
Province to help fund renamed Art Gallery of Alberta

Rick McConnell and Shawn Ohler
The Edmonton Journal


Thursday, October 13, 2005


EDMONTON - Los Angeles architect Randall Stout will be named today as the winner of an international competition to design the city's new $48-million art gallery, The Journal has learned.

Officials will also announce at a news conference this morning that the gallery is to be renamed the Art Gallery of Alberta and will receive a much-needed $15-million funding boost from the provincial government.

Sources say the name change and crucially timed investment from the province are meant to reflect Edmonton's standing as the capital city and "the important part the gallery can play in Alberta's cultural fabric."

As late as Tuesday, the art gallery still hadn't received word that the province was prepared to help fund the project. But at this morning's news conference, Community Development Minister Gary Mar is expected to hand over the money to gallery officials, who will also announce that Stout has won the high-profile design competition.

Today's announcement brings to a close a competition that began months ago with submissions from more than two dozen architects from around the world.

That list was shortened in April to four international firms. In May, the finalists made presentations at a Royal Architectural Institute of Canada conference held in Edmonton.

Last month, the firms submitted detailed plans, drawings and models, which have been on display at the gallery. Each firm sent representatives to a public meeting last week attended by more than 400 people.

The gallery's seven-member selection jury then made its recommendation to the board.

Earlier this week the gallery issued a statement saying the four competitors had all been asked make travel arrangements to return to Edmonton today "to be present for the official announcement of the winning design should their submission be selected."

Just before 8 p.m. Wednesday, Stout checked in at the Fairmont Hotel Macdonald. The Los Angeles architect said he'd been asked by the gallery not to talk about the competition before this morning's announcement.

Stout did say he made several trips to Edmonton this summer to familiarize himself with the city.

"I look forward to doing more of that," he said.

A rising star in his field, Stout, 47, was the youngest architect on the short list. His recent work includes the Art Museum of Western Virginia, now under construction in Roanoke, Va., and a 29,000-sq.-foot addition to the Hunter Museum of American Art, which opened in April in Chattanooga, Tenn.

Born and raised in Tennessee, Stout was valedictorian for his bachelor of architecture class at the University of Tennessee in 1981. He was awarded a Pittman Fellowship during his master's program studies at Rice University.

After graduation, he spent seven years working with famed American architect Frank Gehry, whose numerous designs include the Guggenheim Museum in Bilbao, Spain, and the Walt Disney Concert Hall in Los Angeles.

A proponent of environmentally responsible architecture, Stout has said his design for the Edmonton gallery will save four million cubic pounds of carbon dioxide each year, compared to conventional construction methods.

Two years ago, Stout's firm received the American Institute of Architects' Top Ten Green award for its design of the Steinhude Sea Recreational Facility in Germany.

In his design for a new gallery that will change the face of Edmonton's arts district, Stout has said he drew inspiration from the aurora borealis and from Inuit stone sculptures called inukshuks. His plan, which will add to the existing building, calls for the use of expanses of glass and swooping curves of patinaed zinc and stainless steel.

Stout was selected from a list that included the world's most famous female architect, the flamboyant Iraqi-born Zaha Hadid, winner of the prestigious 2004 Pritzker Prize.

Also in the competition were controversial British designer Will Alsop, whose only Canadian building is the Sharp Centre for Design at the Ontario College of Art, which is raised 26 metres above street level on 12 multicoloured stilts.

Canada was represented on the list by Vancouver's Arthur Erickson, whose long and distinguished career includes the Museum of Glass

in Tacoma, Wash., which opened three years ago, and the Museum of Anthropology on the University of British Columbia campus, which opened in 1976.

With the province's $15 million, the Edmonton art gallery has now raised $40 million for its new building, including $10 million from the federal government and $6 million from the City of Edmonton.

Another $9 million, including $5 million from Edmonton philanthropists John and Barbara Poole, has come from private donors, despite the fact the private fundraising campaign hasn't officially begun.

The construction tab for the new gallery, which will be added to the existing Brutalist-style box on the northeast corner of Sir Winston Churchill Square, is expected to be $27 million to $30 million.

rmcconnell@thejournal.canwest.com

sohler@thejournal.canwest.com

© The Edmonton Journal 2005

i liked the vision of alsop, but stout was hard to criticize....good on edmonton

STOUT?!? WTH?! i though someone said alsop!

pssh stout... frank gehry wannabe. i'm pissed

THE JOURNAL
Local Update

Art gallery designed as work of art
What do you think? Post your opinions

Larry Johnsrude Sound Off
Edmonton Journal

October 13, 2005

Gift-wrapped in a swirling tangle of stainless steel ribons, Edmonton's new art gallery won't merely be a depository for art work.

It will be a piece of art in itself.

Or at least that's the thinking behind the choice of Los Angeles architect Randall Stout's modernistic design for the new $48 million Art Gallery of Alberta.

Of the four designs in the running, Stout's iinterpretation of the Alberta art scene spoke the loudest, say gallery officials.

"In the final analysis, this design provided a friendly, open design inviting to people on the street level to make them want to come into the gallery," says Allan Scott, chairman of the art gallery board and member of the seven-person that picked the design. "It recognized the whole range of things that we do in the art gallery, from children's education and being a meeting space. This will allow us to show our permanent collection and it will enable us to handle travelling collections.

"On top of that, it has great architectural lines and will be a landmark and a true piece of impact architecture and a landmark for Edmonton."

The winning design was annouced this morning. The provincial government is kicking in $15 million towards its $48 million cost, the federal government has committed $10 million, the city is contributing $6 million and another $9 million is coming from private donations, including $5 million from Edmonton philanthropists John and Barbara Poole. The design was the least conventional of the four under consideration.

Stout says it's designed to reach out to the community.

"It's really an effort to understand the climate, to understand the programming of the museum and express that through architecture," he says. "We have been very sculptural with the public spaces of the building and we have been quite reserved and neutral with the art exibit spaces. We feel this duality represents the appropriate way of combining exuberant space with art space."

He says it "responds well" to the pyramid-shaped designs of City Hall across the street and the rectangular Winspear Centre next door.

"It will certainly be recognized among architects and will be providing facilities that are outstanding," he says.

What others are saying:

"The building will make an artistic statement of who we are." — Deputy Prime Minister Anne McLellan.

"It will be a work of art in itself and a magnet for creativity." — Alberta Community Development Minister Gary Mar.

"The country will recognize Edmonton as an arts leader." — Coun. Linda Sloan.

What do you think of the new design? Post your comments below.

© Edmonton Journal 2005

love it...love the lrt incorporation

STOUT?!? WTH?! i though someone said alsop!

pssh stout... frank gehry wannabe. i'm pissed
/\ It was his mentor and like most 'pupils', they learn from them.

None the less, we'll have an aesthetically pleasing piece of architecture gracing the streets accross from Churchill Square.

Erickson

I know this is a really old thread, but I just came across it and it's quite an interesting read. I just want to say, the Alsop design sucked! It is such an ugly design I can't believe you guys like it. But, to each his own I guess.

My two favourites were stout and erickson.