The Schelling Architecture Foundation will not award a theory prize in 2024

The Schelling Architecture Awards, which this year focus on the architectural and architectural-theoretical examination of interventions in global ecosystems and their consequences for humans and nature, will be presented in Karlsruhe on November 20. Three international landscape architecture firms have been nominated for this award, they will present themselves and their work to the public. The award decision and presentation will be announced immediately afterwards. In keeping with the tradition of the Schelling Architecture Prize, the nomination of the theory prize winner has already been determined and the prize will be awarded at the same time as the respective architecture prize. This year’s nominee for the theory prize was James Bridle from the UK, whose publications on the complex relationships between society, technology and ecology have greatly enriched the current discourse. It has now become known that James Bridle recently co-signed a call for a boycott of Israeli cultural institutions in the online magazine “The Literary Hub”.
(https://lithub.com/hundreds-of-authors-pledge-to-boycott-israeli-cultural-institutions/) However, the Schelling Foundation faces a profound and delicate problem, a problem arising from our awareness of Germany’s history and of the responsibilities resulting from that history. James Bridle’s signature on a call to boycott Israeli cultural institutions is directly at odds with this responsibility – and it is the reason the Foundation is unable to award him the prize. This was decided unanimously by all of the Foundation’s committees. We respect the right to express James Bridle’s political position, especially as the foundation is not accusing James Bridle of anti-Semitism. But the Foundation can neither support nor be associated with a call for the cultural isolation of Israel.