The Museum of Outdoor Arts (MOA), a Colorado-based arts organization, is pleased to announce the winning teams of its fifth annual national collegiate design competition as part of its award winning Design and Build education program. In April, individual and student teams from across the US submitted their conceptual design proposals. The entries were then juried by a distinguished panel of professionals in the field. Four exceptional teams emerged as winners, representing the finest entries received in the competition.
MOA sought out conceptual proposals for the competition from art, architecture, design, and other creatively focused USA-based undergraduate and graduate students. Submissions addressed this year’s challenge of designing ‘Land Art: Celestial Architecture’ for one of five geographic area types, utilizing architecture, landscape architecture and/or sculpture as a design solution to the challenge. Students showcased their creativity by developing conceptual projects tailored for various locations worldwide, flexing their artistic and architectural skills to address the theme.
The jury included:
Cynthia Madden Leitner- President and Executive Director of the Museum of Outdoor Arts
Robert Ferry and Elizabeth Monoian – Founding Co-Directors of the Land Art Generator Initiative (LAGI)
Jill O’Bryan- Artist
Charles Ross- Artist
Winning Entries
First Place – $10,000 Award
University of Colorado Denver (Denver, Colorado)
College of Architecture and Planning
Aidan Nowell, 2nd Year Master of Landscape Architecture
Steven Pearlman, 2nd Year Master of Landscape Architecture
Second Place – $7,500 Award
University of Texas at Austin (Austin, Texas) School of Architecture
Aarif Ahmad, 4th-year Bachelor of Architecture
Third Place – $5,000 Award
School of Visual Arts (New York, New York)
Jessie Soos, 4th Year Bachelor of Fine Arts, Fine Arts
Serena Hanzhi Wang, 4th Year Bachelor of Fine Arts, Visual and Critical Studies
Honorable Mention – $1,500 Award
University of Cincinnati (Cincinnati, Ohio) College of Design, Architecture, Art, and Planning, School of Architecture and Interior Design
Luke Commons, 4th Year Bachelor of Science in Architecture
Ravi Kumar, 4th Year Bachelor of Science in Architecture
Natalie Overstreet, 4th Year Bachelor of Science in Architecture
Reece Sherman, 4th Year Bachelor of Science in Architecture
Joyce Zheng, 4th Year Bachelor of Science in Architecture
“Though the competition focuses mainly on architecture, it offers students a chance to integrate art and landscape into their designs,” said Cynthia Madden Leitner, President and Executive Director of the Museum of Outdoor Arts. “This aligns with our history of creating environments that blend art, architecture, and landscape seamlessly.”
The Design and Build Competition is just one offering under the umbrella of the MOA Design and Build Program. Since 1991, MOA’s Design and Build program has provided opportunities for emerging creatives, including art, architecture, landscape architecture and design students to express their creativity in collaborative art, architecture, and design projects. Students can participate through community outreach projects, a paid summer internship, alumni projects, fellowship, and the design competition. Since the inception of the program thousands of students have collaborated on site-specific installations and design projects. Assisted by professional faculty and artists in residence, Design and Build participants have produced exciting and original site-specific art works for MOA sites and public spaces throughout the Denver metro area.
2024 marks the fifth year of the national competition arm to the Design and Build program. The mission of the program is “to motivate invention through collaborative creativity.” The goal of the competition is to cultivate potential from emerging artists, architecture, and design students, and other creatives and to allow students the space to conceptualize inventive ideas within a set of boundaries. It is the goal of MOA to prototype designs in the future.
A call for the next competition challenge will be available this fall. The next competition will be open to individuals, teams, and university faculty who wish to take the competition on as a class project. More information may be found on the Design and Build Competition website.
Design & Build Competition
The Design and Build Competition is open to any undergraduate or graduate students currently enrolled in a USA college and garners an online repository of art, architecture and design concepts. The competition is based on an annual theme and/or challenge provided by MOA. A distinguished panel of jurors, evaluate the submissions. Cash prizes totaling $24,000 (as of 2024) will be awarded to the top four submissions. In addition, winning entries are featured on the Design and Build Competition Archive website. Submissions should comprise of conceptual designs from creatively driven individual students, student teams and classes in the fields of art, architecture, design, and related disciplines. The competition is free to enter. Visit https://moaonline.org/design-and-build-competition/ for the additional details about the competition.