The Impossible Museum : Architecture Prize

THE COMPETITION

We’re waiting to hear about your architecture projects! Just like Frank Lloyd Wright with the Guggenheim, Jean Nouvel with the Louvre Abu Dhabi, Frank Gehry with the Fondation Louis Vuitton, Ieoh Ming Pei with the Louvre, or Oscar Niemeyer with the Niteroi Museum, you dream of putting your creative talent and passion into serving Beauty, Art and Originality. In architecture, designing a museum is the peak of many architects’ work. Temple for the arts, the museum becomes an artwork in itself. As such, it mirrors and shelters one of the oldest human religions: artistic contemplation. Whether an Architect, Engineer, Artist, Urban Planner, Designer, Student or an Enthusiast, you can contribute to the museum design by submitting an idea for the museum of tomorrow. A museum in virtual reality, with a universal reach. A museum with the ambition of becoming the most visited museum in less that 2 years! A place to live art. A place to share and meet. A sublime receptacle for creation. In this era of digital sharing, you are all invited to design a bold and innovative museum – even one that could not exist in real life. Challenge the laws of physics and gravity! Design the greatest museum in the world! The winner will see their design come to life down to the most intricate details. They will become the architect of the first universal museum in virtual reality, worldwide. 

ABOUT UMA

What drives UMA is the spirit of sharing. Art and culture are meant to find a place in everyone’s daily lives. UMA goes beyond academic constraints to deliver a simple, attractive and pedagogical discourse. UMA is a museum in virtual reality, that collaborates with specialists and institutions to realise unique exhibitions accessible for free, anywhere, all the time. Whether you’re equipped with a laptop, a tablet, a smartphone, a VR headset, or any device, it has never been easier to visit a museum.

 C O N D I T I O N S  O F  E L I G I B I L I T Y

Participation is open to students, architects, designers, urban planners, artists, or anyone with a creative knack and a talent for drawing! Participants are free to compete individually or in teams, where they will pick a “project leader”. 

T E R M S  O F  P A R T I C I P A T I O N 

Participants must choose to submit: one or several drawings or models; or a 3D model; or a video of the project. The submissions will be emailed to [email protected], or sent by post to UMA, 90, rue de la Folie-Méricourt, 75011 Paris. Participants are invited to concentrate on designing the exterior of the building and the main reception rooms. The blueprint details will be subsequently fleshed out with UMA’s 3D modellers. The museum must have a unique originality and identity. The museum can be free of any usual constraint of physical reality. The museum must still answer the functional demands of distribution, reception, and circulation that make it into a proper destination for collections of artworks.

C R I T E R I A   F O R  E V A L U A T I O N

The jury will attribute the prize according to the originality of the design and the quality of the architectural composition. The jury consists of the 4 founding-associates of UMA, one architect, one 3D modeller, one professor of architecture and two experts in museography. The jury’s decision will be made public after deliberation and a majority vote. The jury’s decision is final. 

C O L L A B O R A T I O N  W I T H  T H E  W I N N E R

 UMA will fully collaborate with the winner to finance and give life to the museum of their dreams. The selected design will become the main building of UMA and the first museum in virtual reality: a museum with a universal reach, accessible worldwide. Collaboration with the winner will take multiple forms. UMA’s 3D modellers and web designers may have to model the building, while the winner will follow the process every step of the way and bring comments and ultimate validation. 

C A L E N D A R
- February 5, 2018 : Opening of the applications
- March 11, 2018 : Deadline for submissions.
- March 14, 2018 : The Winner is announced
- March 21, 2018 : 3D realisation of the museum begins
-June/July 2018 : The winning building in virtual reality is online on www.the-uma.org

L E G A L  A N D  I N T E L L E C T U A L  P R O P E R T Y  R I G H T S

The participants yield to the organisers on a non-exclusive basis and within the limitations mentioned below, their property rights on the projects submitted to UMA. They are granted worldwide for free for the duration of the literary and artistic rights. This session confers to the organisers the faculty of exercising personally or vicariously the property rights of the participants, for the following uses. • Under the right of representation, the organisers have the right to exhibit the projects during manifestations in France and abroad, whether for free or payable access, and the right to circulate the projects on the Internet network dedicated to this competition on the basis of public consultation. • Under the right of reproduction, the organisers have the right to reproduce the projects on any support – paper, audio, video, magnetic, photographic, optic, digital – known or unknown to this day and to store the projects in digital files for he purpose of circulating them on the Internet network aforementioned. All rights which exploitation is not expressly authorized within the terms of the present article are reserved to the project leader. The latter commits to crediting UMA whenever his project is exploited.  

COMMUNICATION

UMA will inform the press of the competition results through a press release and will release the results online on the UMA website and all its social networks. The selected project will be published on the UMA website and will be published on UMA’s partners’ websites.

O T H E R

 Participation to this competition means full acceptation of the present regulations. UMA will not be held liable if the competition is entirely postponed or cancelled. UMA retains the right to modify, prolong, or cancel the present competition without being held liable. The interpretation of the present regulations lies solely within the competence of the organisers.