This was a breaking news story that was updated with additional information.
This year's Pritzker Architecture Prize, the most prestigious international honor for architects, has been awarded to Indian architect Balkrishna Doshi, Hon. FAIA, prize officials announced today.
"By granting him the award this year," the jury citation notes, "the Pritzker Prize jury recognizes his exceptional architecture as reflected in over a hundred buildings he has realized, his commitment and his dedication to his country and the communities he has served, his influence as a teacher, and the outstanding example he has set for professionals and students around the world throughout his long career."
Doshi is the first Indian architect to receive the Pritzker Prize. In a press release, Doshi described the recognition as a “deeply touching and rewarding recognition of my work."
Born in Pune, India, in 1927, he attended the Sir J. J. School of Architecture Bombay in Mumbai. In his early career, he worked for Le Corbusier in Europe and then later back in his home country, where he managed projects for Corbusier in Chandigarh and Ahmedabad, including the Shodhan House (1956) and the Mill Owner’s Association Building (1954), both located in Ahmedabad. Doshi also collaborated with Louis Khan on the Indian Institute of Management in Ahmedabad.
Doshi established his own firm, then named Vastushilpa, in 1956. Today known as Vastushilpa Consultants, the firm's built work includes dozens of projects across India, including the Indian Institute of Management in Lucknow (1987) and the Aranya Community Housing (1989) in Indore, which received an Aga Khan Award for Architecture. He founded the Centre for Environmental Planning and Technology's School of Architecture in Ahmedabad in 1962, and completed several projects for the center (today known as CEPT University) over the next four decades.
"With an understanding and appreciation of the deep traditions of India’s architecture, he united prefabrication and local craft and developed a vocabulary in harmony with the history, culture, local traditions and the changing times of his home country India," the jury citation notes.
Last year's Pritzker Prize was awarded to to Spanish architects Rafael Aranda, Hon. FAIA, Carme Pigem, Hon. FAIA, and Ramon Vilalta, Hon. FAIA, the founders of RCR Arquitectes. That prize was the first time in history that the Pritzker was given to three recipients.
The 2018 Pritzker Architecture Prize jury was comprised of chair Glenn Murcutt, architect and 2002 Pritzker Laureate in Sydney; Stephen Breyer, U.S. Supreme Court Justice in Washington, D.C.; André Aranha Corrêa do Lago, architectural critic, curator, and Brazilian ambassador to Japan in Tokyo; Peter Palumbo, chairman emeritus of the trustees of the Serpentine Galleries and former chairman of the Arts Council of Great Britain, London; Richard Rogers, Hon. FAIA, architect and 2007 Pritzker Laureate in London; Sejima Kazuyo, architect and 2010 Pritzker Laureate in Tokyo; Benedetta Tagliabue, architect and educator in Barcelona, Spain; Ratan N. Tata, chairman of Tata Trusts in Mumbai; Wang Shu, architect and 2012 Pritzker Laureate in Hangzhou, China; Martha Thorne, executive director of the Pritzker Prize and dean of the IE School of Architecture & Design in Madrid.
An award ceremony will be held at the Aga Khan Museum in Toronto in May.
