ARCHITECTURE LECTURE: 2019-20 BRANNER, STUMP & BECKERMAN FELLOWS

Recent Branner, Stump & Beckerman Fellowship recipients will be presenting their research to the CED community! Following the lecture, there will be a reception in 108 Wurster, alongside the 2019-20 Branner, Stump & Beckerman Fellows Exhibition. 

2019-20 BRANNER FELLOWS

Thomas DeVore, Tara Shi

2019-20 BRANNER & STUMP FELLOW

Sandy Curth

2019-20 BRANNER & BECKERMAN FELLOW

Caroline Chen

ABOUT THE AWARDS

The John K. Branner Traveling Fellowship, Harold Stump Memorial Traveling Fellowship, and Andrew Beckerman Travel Fellowship offer $10,000-$20,000 prizes for international travel and research, awarded annually to Option 2 or 3 Master of Architecture (M.Arch.) students in the College of Environmental Design. The fellowships support independent travel in exploration of a particular architectural question or issue. Although the topic of research may optionally be expanded as a thesis, it is expected that the experience of travel will enrich the fellow’s design studies. Upon returning from their travels, Fellows present their findings to the CED community in the form of a lecture and exhibition during the Architecture Spring Semester Lecture Series.

The John K. Branner Fellowship was established in 1969 for the purpose of maintaining and providing traveling fellowships to outstanding students of architecture at the College of Environmental Design at the University of California, Berkeley. Since the fund was established, there have been over 200 Branner Fellows. The fellowship fund is named for John Kennedy Branner, a prominent Bay Area architect of the early 20th century and the elder son of Stanford University’s second president, John Casper Branner. After completing his degree in architecture at Columbia University, Branner pursued travel and study in Europe, which he believed was formative to his development as a designer. Upon returning to San Francisco, Branner maintained a successful practice specializing in residential architectural design for 46 years. His principal works include Stanford Stadium, numerous residences in Hillsborough, Palo Alto, and Woodside, several fraternity houses at Stanford, and the Mein Estate in Woodside. 

The Harold Stump Memorial Traveling Fellowship enables an outstanding architectural graduate to spend up to four months exploring significant architectural monuments in Europe and other parts of the world. The student is encouraged, through independent travel, to achieve a greater understanding and appreciation of the art and architecture that has influenced the architectural profession throughout history. The fellowship fund was established in 2016 by Lester Wertheimer (M.Arch ’52). The fund is named for Professor Harold Stump (B.A. Architecture ‘26), who taught Wertheimer and encouraged him to apply for the Le Conte Memorial Fellowship, which he received while a student at CED. It permitted him to travel for one year visiting important historic and modern works of architecture and had a significant impact on his life and career in architecture.

The Andrew Beckerman Travel Fellowship provides support to an outstanding architectural graduate student to spend up to four months exploring significant architectural monuments in Europe and other parts of the world. The student is encouraged, through independent travel, to achieve a greater understanding and appreciation of the art and architecture that has influenced the architectural profession throughout history. The fellowship fund was established in 2018 by Andrew Beckerman. Andrew Beckerman graduated from UC Berkeley in 1973 with a Master’s in Architecture. He received the John K. Branner Travelling Fellowship in 1974. His time at UC Berkeley, coupled with that Branner Fellowship, formed the foundation of a successful career in community based architecture and planning.

This event is sponsored by the John K. Branner Endowment, Harold Stump Endowment, and Andrew Beckerman Endowment; and it is part of the Spring 2020 Berkeley Architecture Lecture Series.

Caroline Chen

Occupy Autopia

As a subset of vehicular infrastructure, the type of elevated highways has been transplanted throughout the world as a marker of post-war modernity. Contemporary dialogue universally problematizes these projects as agents of social segregation and environmental pollution. While removal is often infeasible, this research seeks to follow and catalogue the variable ways in which highway infrastructure is occupied. 

Sandy Curth

The Softening Edge

How do we anchor shelter to ground that is slipping away? A new paradigm of instability is growing, the result of direct industrial action and long term climatic consequence. Traveling to sites around the world experiencing the extremes of climatic and industrial impact I surveyed a class of tenuous structures that exist at the intersection of new and ever changing modes of decay and spoke with their inhabitants about the future.

Thomas DeVore

The Construction of Sanctity

Conceptions of sanctity are often supported by the transfiguration of raw matter into sacred objects and sacred spaces. Following the journey of materials from extraction to construction, this research examines how materials are shaped to serve powerful social functions and inspire phenomenological effects.

Tara Shi

Automation and the Architectural Imagination

Automation is emerging in many contemporary work environments and redefining our concept of labor. While today’s technological capacities are unprecedented, radical movements more than half a century ago foresaw its power—for some automation was a liberating force, while others imagined dark utopias. In my research, I surveyed 4 labor typologies—the office, factory, home and shop—to catalogue these emergent environments while revisiting the neo-avante-garde ideas of the 60’s and 70’s.