Iowa State University’s Department of Architecture Announces Recipient of the H. Kennard Bussard Award
Presented by RDG Planning & Design, the fifth-year student project prize recognizes outstanding ability and creativity in the architecture design process.
The Iowa State University Department of Architecture recently announced the winner of the H. Kennard Bussard Award. Presented by RDG Planning & Design, the fifth-year undergraduate architecture studio award recognizes a student who presents outstanding ability and creativity in the architecture design process. Brandon Leeder was named the 2022 recipient and recognized during ISU’s spring award ceremony on April 28, 2022.
The H. Kennard Bussard Award has been conferred in honor of Bussard, one of RDG’s founding partners, and recognizes work that best develops a well-communicated and conceptually rigorous architectural response to a project assignment. Winners are selected by a judging team made up of guest critics within the architecture field and/or faculty, and the Chair of the Department of Architecture. This year’s jury included RDG’s Anne Machian, PLA, ASLA, Blaine Perau, AIA, Brad Rodenburg, AIA, LEED AP BD+C, WELL AP and Nate Gieselman, AIA, NCARB, as well as ISU Architecture Professor & Chair Deborah Hauptmann.
Leeder’s project, titled “Agro-Pastoralism Post Techno-Utopia,” derives from the idea that “that technological fantasies…fail to critically engage with the language of architectural forms of primitive accumulation in systemic relationship to landscape conditions; likewise, the visual rhetoric of the pastoral landscape must be subverted to move beyond the techno-utopian fantasy.” In his work, Leeder seeks to subvert simple questions on the evolution of form and portrayal of landscape to envision new landscape imaginaries and open up new forms of worldmaking.
Read more about “Agro-Pastoralism Post Techno-Utopia” here.