Yen Ha

"For the Many" elaborates on Ha's work in the realm of architecture, speculative and realized, as well as her artistic practice. Regardless of the medium or outcome, her work explores the connection between people and place, prioritizing the environmental welfare of communities and their inhabitants. From an art installation in Gdansk, Poland to a community library in Sharpsburg, PA, Ha's projects reveal a need to understand how spaces will be inhabited and their evolution over time. She illustrates that meaningful experiences can be made within the framework of strict budgets and limited resources. Moving within the realm of drawing, Ha continues to explore projects that tactilely and emotionally engage the public. Her work constantly wonders - for whom do we make architecture and art?

 

Yen Ha is an architect, artist and writer. Born in Saigon, she lives in New York City, where she co-founded the architecture firm, Front Studio. She has an undergraduate degree from Carnegie Mellon University and a graduate degree from L’École d’Architecture in Paris. A licensed architect, Yen’s work has been featured in Interior Design, Icon Magazine, Wallpaper and The New York Times. She has taught at Washington University in St Louis and now Rice University, as well as having been an invited juror at Parsons, University of Pennsylvania and Harvard.

 

Ha has been awarded artist residencies by the Banff Centre for Arts and Creativity, MASS MoCA and the Arctic Circle. Her short stories appear in Waxwing, Crack the Spine and Hypertext. Most recently Ha’s artwork was featured on a full-size billboard in New York City as part of the “Asians Belong Here” public art campaign.

 

Building Identities

 

Construction of physical structures is inseparable from the construction of human identities. Rice Architecture aims to broaden our understanding of building construction and identity formation as two interrelated processes, seeking to close the gap between the social and the formal in the field of architecture and our world more broadly. Reflecting the pluralism of Houston as the most diverse city in the United States, Building Identities advances the agency of architecture in a new multicultural world. We believe this is an urgent theme for our school, our community, and our field at large.

 

All lectures are free and open to the public. Except for virtual events, all lectures will be held in Farish Gallery, MD Anderson Hall, Rice Architecture, unless otherwise noted, with a livestream available. For more information and to access the livestream links and virtual events registration page, visit arch.rice.edu/latest/events. Each lecture is available for one AIA/CES Learning Unit.

 

This lecture series is made possible through the generous support of the Llewelyn-Davis Sahni Fund for the Rice School of Architecture, the Betty R. and the George F. Pierce Jr., FAIA, Fund, the William B. Coleman Jr. Colloquium Fund for Architecture, the Wm. W. Caudill Lecture Series Fund, and Rice Design Alliance (RDA), the public programs and outreach arm of Rice Architecture.