The winner of the Golden Lion for Lifetime Achievement at the 13th International Architecture Exhibition has been announced. Alvaro Siza Vieira will accept the award on 29 August during the opening ceremony of this summer’s la Biennale di Venezia. David Chipperfield, Director of this year’s Biennale, proposed Alvaro Siza Vieira as a candidate for the prize with the following explanation:

“It is difficult to think of a contemporary architect who as maintained such a consistent presence within the profession as Alvaro Siza. That this presence is maintained by an architect that lives and works in the extreme Atlantic margin of Europe only serves to emphasise his authority and his status.”

This is not Siza’s first award at the Biennale. He was presented with Golden Lion Award in 2002 for his Ibere Camargo Foundation project in Porto Alegre, a cultural base whose clean angles and smooth lines won him the prize. Siza also received the Pritzker Prize in 1992, the Culture Merit Order Medal from the Brazilian Government in 2007 and the International Union of Architects’ 2011 Gold Medal.