The Henning Larsen Foundation honours Lyricist Søren Ulrik Thomsen
This year's honorary grant is awarded to the Danish poet, essayist and one of the great existential thinkers of our time, Søren Ulrik Thomsen, who is praised for exploring the field of architecture through his poetry.
On Monday 21 August, Søren Ulrik Thomsen was celebrated at a gathering at Orangeriet in Kongens Have in Copenhagen, where he received this year's honorary grant of 100,000 DKK on the occasion of the late founder’s birthday.
Since his debut in 1977, Danish poet and essayist Søren Ulrik Thomsen has created some of the most significant and widely read poems and essays in modern Danish literature. With a long list of publications, including poetry collections and essays, as well as many debating posts, interviews, and lectures, Søren Ulrik Thomsen has established himself as one of the great existential thinkers of our time, whose insights into human emotional resonance and coherence are expressed through his poetic practice.
In his debut publication “City Slang” from 1981, the language of human emotions and the language of describing the physical and expressive character of the city are woven into a single poetic word stream, where city, building, material and space grasp and express human life in general – and particularly in the city.
The body and soul being present in the streets, in the city and especially in Copenhagen plays a prominent role in significant parts of Søren Ulrik Thomsen's writing. In several contexts Søren Ulrik Thomsen has taken a poetic and debating approach to the city's past, present and development. Most recently he has done so as a member of the judging panel at the municipality of Copenhagen for the selection of buildings and places that contribute particularly to the soul of the capital.
"Architect Henning Larsen established his foundation more than 20 years ago with the purpose of annually honoring people who actively contribute to expanding and opening up the field of architecture with a focus on artistic quality. Henning Larsen was personally a great admirer of Søren Ulrik Thomsen's writing. It is an admiration that we on the foundation's board share to a very high degree. Many have written fantastic poems about human life - about our existence - and even more have written many good books about architecture. But few have, like Søren Ulrik Thomsen, developed the language for both human existential feelings and the existence of architecture. In the spirit of Henning Larsen, we would like to honour Søren Ulrik Thomsen for his poetic efforts to capture humanity and architecture in a shared presence at the highest artistic level." says architect Kent Martinussen, Chairman of the Board of the Henning Larsen Foundation.
About the Henning Larsen Foundation
Henning Larsen's Foundation was founded with private funds by architect Henning Larsen in 2001, and has since then made distributions every year on the late founder's birthday, August 20. The foundation, which is non-profit and charitable, aims to support Danish architecture in the broadest sense. Several Danish architects have received the award, and the Foundation has held international competitions for architectural photography, architectural drawing, as well as writing about architecture.
The board of Henning Larsen's Foundation consists of architect Troels Troelsen, architect and managing director of Danish Architecture Center Kent Martinussen (chairman), architect Ingela Larsson, architect Simon Ingvartsen, MA Bente Scavenius, MSc. Lone Backe and lawyer Niels Bang.
Images by Agnete Schlichtkrull
