Today, Columbia University's Graduate School of Architecture, Planning and Preservation (GSAPP) announced the appointment of Spanish architect Andrés Jaque as the new director of its M.S. Advanced Architectural Design (AAD) program. Jaque (pronouced "HA-kay") is the founder of the New York– and Madrid-based Office for Political Innovation, and has taught advanced design studios at GSAPP since 2013.
“I am thrilled for Andrés Jaque to take on the directorship of GSAPP’s Advanced Architectural Design program," said the school's dean, Amale Andraos, in a press release. "He has been an important member of our faculty who is greatly admired by faculty and students alike for his unique reframing of architecture and its ability to engage the urgent issues of our time, as well as his ability to re-shape design and contemporary practice through his influential pedagogical approach.”
A graduate of the Superior Technical School of Architecture of Madrid, Jaque founded his practice in 2003 and has been widely recognized for his work (including by ARCHITECT, which profiled him as a Next Progressive in 2013). In 2014, Jaque was awarded the Silver Lion for best research project at the 14th Venice Biennale of Architecture. In 2015, his practice won the MoMA PS1 Young Architects competition, which led to the installation of its COSMO installation. Jaque's IKEA Disobedients project is the first architectural performance to be acquired by the Museum of Modern Art.
Jacque is replacing GSAPP associate professore Enrique Walker who has directed the AAD program, a three-semester degree for students who have already graduated with an M.Arch. or B.Arch., since 2008.
“I’m very thankful for the rigorous vision and dedication that Enrique Walker has brought to the program during his directorship," Andraos said in the release. "Enrique established a strong legacy of bringing experimental approaches to research and design, and built a program that is firmly grounded in forming positions through design.”
“More than ever, architecture is now a key player in the challenges the world faces," Jaque said in the same release. "The AAD program occupies a unique position from which the relevance of architecture can be claimed, explored, and expanded—both as a need and as a great opportunity to reinvent the way we relate to environments, technologies, and cultures."
Jacque will begin his new role on June 1.
