Liu Jiakun 刘家琨

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The Pulitzer Architecture Prize   2025 Laureate Liu Jiakun

(1) https://www.pritzkerprize.com/laureates/liu-jiakun
(a) One may click "简体中文" for all pages in this website.
(b) Liu Jiakun Biography in English has one clause (in bold) that is not translated into Chinese: "Born in 1956 in Chengdu, People's Republic of China, he spent much of his childhood in the corridors of Chengdu Second People's Hospital [成都第二人民医院], founded as Gospel Hospital in 1892, where his mother was an internist * * * At seventeen, Liu was part of China's Zhiqing [知青], or program of 'educated youth' assigned to vocational peasant farming in the countryside. Life, at the time, felt inconsequential, until he was accepted to attend the Institute of Architecture and Engineering in Chongqing [重庆建筑工程学院] (renamed Chongqing University) in 1978. Admittedly, he didn't fully comprehend what it meant to be an architect but, 'like a dream, I suddenly realized my own life was important.' * * * 'I always aspire to be like water—to permeate through a place without carrying a fixed form of my own and to seep into the local environment and the site itself. Over time, the water gradually solidifies, transforming into architecture, and perhaps even into the highest form of human spiritual creation. Yet, it still retains all the qualities of that place, both good and bad.' [我一直渴望能像水一样，不拘泥于任何固定的形式，渗透到当地的环境和场地之中，随着时间的推移，水会逐渐凝固，化为建筑——甚至有可能演化为人类精神创造的最高形式。然而，它仍然保留了那个地方的所有特性——无论是好是坏。]    He established Jiakun Architects in 1999 in Chengdu" 家琨建筑师事务所.

(I) Gospel Hospital  福音医院: "四川第一所西医医院" (百度百科); "加拿大美道会传教士启尔德等在成都市四圣祠街开创" (zh.wikipedia.org for 成都市医院列表).
(A) 美道会  Canadian Methodist Mission
https://zh.wikipedia.org/zh-hans/美道会
(B) There is a page in both en.wikipedai.org (Omar Leslie Kilborn) and zh.wikipedia.org (启尔德), who received medical degree from Queen’s University in Kingston, Ontario, Canada. The English surname Kilbourn (and its variants Kilborn and Kilburn( are/were place names that means "stream by a kiln."


(2) Liu's designs are collected in an e-manual:

in English: 2025 Prize Laureate Liu Jiakun People's Republic of China   Image Book.  
https://www.pritzkerprize.com/si ... e%20Book%202025.pdf

(a) Luyeyuan Stone Sculpture Art Museum. 2002. Chengdu.   鹿野苑石刻艺术博物馆 (address: 成都市郫都区 (renamed from 郫县 in 2015) 新民镇云桥村; 业主：湘财证券工会)
(b) Department of Sculpture, Sichuan Fine Arts Institute (SFAI). 2004. Chongqing.  四川美术学院 (1940- )  雕塑系 (1953- )
(c) Design Department on new campus, Sichuan Fine Arts Institute. 2006. Chongqing.  

SFAI itself lists 设计学院 Design Academy (containing several departments), not "Design Department. The "new campus" alludes to 虎溪 校區, as opposed to old campus 黄桷坪 校區.
(d) Museum of Clocks, Jianchuan Museum Cluster. 2007. Chengdu.
(I) The en.wikipedia.org for Jianchuan Museum Cluster 建川博物馆聚落 says, "It consists of 26 museums which showcase China's largest private collection of artifacts. See also 建川博物馆
https://zh.wikipedia.org/wiki/建川博物馆
("32座分馆")
(II)
(A) A museum among them is Museum of Cultural Revolution Clocks 文革之钟博物馆, consisting of 钟展区, 旗展区, and 章展区 (each -- 钟, 旗, 章 -- in its own building).
(B) 建筑AMATEUR旅行攻略 (undated): "章钟印博物馆的 '文革之钟，' 则是整个聚落里最让我着迷的空间了。钟展区平面方圆相套，方圆之间高而狭窄的间隙中，在凹入处的壁面上满布壁龛，形成四面钟墙。钟展区中心圆形院落不置一物，唯有光影在地面面上静静移动，以示时光流转 psuggesting a dundial]。在经过迷宫般曲折回绕的路径后人们突然进入静谧封闭的空间，身后，是钟表的滴答声和报时声 ，眼前是纯粹的红砖、素混凝土和铺在上面的阳光。之所以称之为 '文革之钟，;是因为在院落的强上展示的，是当年文革中批斗的场景，地上满铺的，是当年各个革命委员会的印章。在这种空间声光氛围里，或许对历史的反思，可以在人们的心中慢慢展开。"
(C) The 3-D model of Museum of Cultural Revolution Clocks:

I do not know what the red means, likely the red bricks. One walks in from the lower left. The first of the three buildings is 钟展区, whose center featured a round wall of red bricks, whose ceiling has a skylight (which I assume is covered with glass). The center is surrounded by a square of four red-brack walls, whose niches hold clocks (whose significance I do not know).
  

(e) Hu Huishan Memorial  胡慧姗纪念馆. 2009. Chengdu.

from the Web: "Hu Huishan, a female [初二] student born in 1993 from Dujiangyan High School who died in the Sichuan earthquake on May 12, 2008."
(f) Shuijingfang Museum. 2013. Chengdu.
("A perimeter of new concrete structures surrounds preexisting wood-framed buildings that exhibit both modern vinification and ancient fermentation practices, respectively, protecting living cultural heritage, figuratively and literally. An expansive courtyard yields new two-story volumes topped with double-pitched roofs that emit narrow streams of sunlight, mimicking the ventilation and light of the original cellars housing kilns, fermentation practices and relics from the Ming and Qing Dynasties. Featuring a range of materials from original timber to eco-friendly 'Rebirth Bricks' from the 2008 Wenchuan earthquake, the museum allows visitors an immersive chronological journey, from antiquity to modern times")
(I) Shuijingfang Museum   水井街酒坊遗址博物馆 (abbreviated: 水井坊遗址博物馆; at 成都市水井街; 属于酒类主题博物馆)
(II) For "double-pitched roof," see list of roof shapes
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_roof_shapes
("Roof angles are an integral component of roof shape, and vary from almost flat to steeply pitched."/ section 1 Roof shapes: single-pitched roof + multi-pitched roof)
(g) Novartis (Shanghai) Block - C6. 2014. Shanghai.  诺华上海园区C6楼
(h) West Village. 2015. Chengdu.

West Village Basis Yard 西村·贝森大院 (abbreviated: 西村大院; address: (四川省成都市青羊区) 贝森北路1号)
(i) Suzhou Museum of Imperial Kiln Brick. 2016. Suzhou.  苏州御窑金砖博物馆
https://zh.wikipedia.org/zh-hans ... A%E7%89%A9%E9%A6%86
(j) Songyang Culture Neighborhood. 2020. Lishui.  浙江省丽水市松阳县 文里·松阳三庙文化交流中心.

松阳三庙 文庙 (孔庙), 武庙, and 城隍庙. 丽博观古·处州遗存—松阳三庙. 丽水市文广旅体局, July 4, 2022.
https://www.lishui.gov.cn/art/20 ... 16410_57336911.html
(k) The Renovation of Tianbao Cave District of Erlang Town. 2021. Luzhou.  
("Nestled in the lush cliffside landscape of Tianbao Peak, Erlang Town Tianbao Cave both emerges and dissolves within its surroundings, exemplifying the reciprocal relationship between humans and nature. Flat, extended eaves reimagine the form of pavilions dating back many millennia")
(I) 二郎镇天宝洞区域改造项目 (地点：四川省泸州市古蔺县二郎镇郎酒基地; 业主：四川省古蔺郎酒厂有限公司)
(II) from the Web: "项目用地位于泸州市古蔺县二郎镇的赤水河畔，天宝峰下的峭壁中段。峭壁上储藏郎酒的天宝洞、地宝洞以及人和洞，是全球最大的天然藏酒洞群。"


(3) 建筑师刘家琨获普利兹克奖，曾为汶川遇难者建纪念馆. 纽约时报中文网, Mar 5, 2025
https://cn.nytimes.com/culture/2 ... ritzker-prize/dual/

, which is translated from

Robin Pogrebin, Chinese Architect Wins Pritzker Prize; Liu Jiakun is known for understated structures that respond to their surroundings. New York Times, Mar 5, 2025, at page C3 (section C is Arts).

The first three paragraphs:

"At 17, Liu Jiakun was sent to labor in the countryside as part of China's 're-education' efforts during the Cultural Revolution.

" 'I didn't see a clear future for me — a lot of things were quite meaningless,' Liu said through a translator (his son, Martin) in a recent phone interview from his office in Chengdu, China. 'I thought at the time that life was inconsequential.'

"Eventually, Liu, now 68, found meaning in architecture * * *


(4) Pulitzer Architecture Prize
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pritzker_Architecture_Prize
("Founded in 1979 by Jay A Pritzker and his wife Cindy, the award is funded by the Pritzker family and sponsored by the Hyatt Foundation")
(a) Stocks traded in New York Stock Exchange, Hyatt hotels are essentially dominated by the Pritzker clan.
(b) The 46 laureates included IM Pei of Chinese descent (Liu is the second), but the award counted Pei as American.