Architect Diebedo Francis Kéré, from the African country of Burkina Faso, has won the Pritzker Prize, the most important global recognition in architecture. The announcement was made on March 15th. Kéré is the first black person to receive the award.  

“Francis Kéré is pioneering architecture – sustainable to the earth and its inhabitants – in lands of extreme scarcity. He is equally architect and servant, improving upon the lives and experiences of countless citizens in a region of the world that is at times forgotten,” said Tom Pritzker, president of the Hyatt Foundation, which sponsors the event, during the announcement of the 51st edition.

The organization highlighted that Kéré uses local materials intelligently, respects the region’s climate, and transforms communities where resources are scarce and collaboration is essential.

Who is Francis Keré?

Keré, 56, lives in Germany and is known for building schools, health centers, houses, buildings, and public spaces in African countries such as Benin, Kenya, Mali, Mozambique, Sudan, and Togo.

Born in a small village, Kéré was the first in his family to go to school in classrooms with no proper air circulation or lighting. To change this, he started to advocate that children have comfortable classrooms. His first building, a school in Gando, where he was born, was built in 2001 with the help of villagers and is one of his most applauded works.

 “It is not because you are rich that you should waste material. It is not because you are poor that you should not try to create quality,” declared Kéré at the award’s announcement. “Everyone deserves quality, everyone deserves luxury, and everyone deserves comfort. We are interlinked and concerns in climate, democracy and scarcity are concerns for us”.

Questions
1) Which statement is true?
a) Kéré uses materials from Germany to build comfortable schools in Africa.
b) Kéré does not care about the material required for his projects.
c) The award praised Kéré’s sustainable use of local materials.
d) Kéré studied in his hometown, Gando, in a building he built.

2) Which parts of your school’s building and classrooms do you like or dislike? Why?

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