• Jury chairman Stefan Behnisch praises exemplary nature of winning projects
• Laureate Thom Mayne donates EUR 80,000 purse to Global Green
• Keynote speaker Klaus Töpfer calls for more action on sustainability
• Film premiere opens travelling exhibition at Zumtobel Light Forum in Dornbirn

Following on from the presentation of the first-ever Zumtobel Group Award on 14 September 2007, a travelling exhibition presenting the outcome of this newly created award with its focus on sustainability in the built environment is to open on 9 November 2007. The exhibition, which portrays the award-winning projects in the categories "Built Environment" and "Research & Initiative" in detail, will first go on show at the Zumtobel Light Forum in Dornbirn, Austria. Details of the eight projects that were highly commended by the jury under its chairman Stefan Behnisch will also be featured. At the opening ceremony there will be addresses by Kristin Feireiss of AEDES, Zumtobel Group CFO Thomas Spitzenfeil, and Dietmar Zembrot, Marketing Director of Zumtobel Lighting. Wolfgang Schiel from the engineering bureau Schlaich Bergermann & Partner will explain the workings of the winning project in the "Research & Initiative" category, the Solar Updraft Tower.

Through this award, Zumtobel is aiming to bring the topic of sustainability in the built environment more fully into the spotlight of public attention. As a pioneer in the development of high-efficiency lighting control systems and in the use of the latest technologies and materials in luminaire design, Zumtobel nonetheless retains a primary focus on the human aspects of lighting. It is only when energy efficiency is combined with the biological and emotional roles of lighting that truly holistic lighting solutions can be created.    

Like the organisation of the Zumtobel Group Award itself, the travelling exhibition has been realised in collaboration with AEDES Architektur Forum Berlin. For 2008, plans envisage the publication of a book about the Zumtobel Group Award, with comprehensive coverage of all 40 projects that were nominated.

One highlight of the opening of the exhibition will be the exclusive pre-premiere of Leonardo DiCaprio's documentary on global warming "The Eleventh Hour". This disturbing portrait of our planet portrays the current situation as the last moment at which the otherwise inevitable downfall of civilisation can still be prevented. The film opens at cinemas in German-speaking countries on 15 November.

The exhibition will be on show at the Zumtobel Light Forum in Dornbirn from 9 - 29 November from 9 a.m. to 5 p.m. It will also be staged in Vienna, Berlin and Spennymoor (UK), as well as at the Zumtobel Light Centres in London, Rome, New York and Sydney.




Media Contact
Astrid Kühn-Ulrich
Zumtobel Group
T+43 (5572) 509-1570
astrid.kuehn@zumtobel.com


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About the Zumtobel Group Award

As the logical next step in its corporate commitment to sustainability, in the spring of 2007 the Zumtobel Group created the Zumtobel Group Award for Humanity and Sustainability in the Built Environment. The award is designed to honour sustainable solutions and approaches in architecture and engineering that make a pioneering contribution to a livable, sustainable and equitable future. The curators of the award are Kristin Feireiss and Hans-Jürgen Commerell, Directors of Aedes Architecture Forum in Berlin. The award features two categories covering built and realized projects on the one hand and research work and independent initiatives on the other. The "Built Environment" category is dedicated to outstanding architectural, engineering or urban design projects realized within the last two years, which meet current demands for models of sustainable living and working and will match up to the needs of the future. The purse in this category is EUR 80,000. The second category "Research and Initiative" is dedicated to innovative research projects and initiatives in architecture and the built environment. These may be developed by NGOs or universities, or independent groups and individuals. Aiming in particular to encourage an emerging generation of researchers and practitioners in architecture and urban design, this category, which carries a purse of EUR 60,000, is intended to foster the progress of ongoing initiatives and research projects.

The Jury of the Zumtobel Group Award 2007

Stefan Behnisch (Chairman) Architect / Behnisch Architekten, Stuttgart (Germany)
Yung Ho Chang, Architect, Head of Department of Architecture / Massachusetts
Institute of Technology, Cambridge (USA)
Colin Fournier, Architect / University College London, London (United Kingdom)
Peter Head, Structural Engineer / Arup, London (United Kingdom)
Andreas Ludwig, Chief Executive Officer / Zumtobel Group, Dornbirn (Austria)
Enrique Norten, Architect / TEN Arquitectos, Mexico City and New York (Mexico, USA)
Kazuyo Sejima, Architect / SANAA, Tokyo (Japan)
Peter Sloterdijk, Philosopher, Dean of Hochschule für Gestaltung, Karlsruhe (Germany)
Anna Tibaijuka, General and Executive Director / UN Habitat, Nairobi (Kenya)