Rick Kinsel announces Neri Oxman the 2014 winner of the Vilcek Prize in Design, "finally, I am pleased to present this year's Vilcek Prize for Design, to Israeli-born Neri Oxman. Neri's work - mixing computational design, digital fabrication, and more - redefines our concept of smart materials, as well as the relationship between matter and environment." Born to a family of architects and builders of the new State of Israel, architect and designer Neri Oxman was raised in Haifa's Mount Carmel overlooking the Mediterranean Sea. Her father was trained at Harvard amidst a young generation of architects dedicated to remaking Modernism. Her mother was the keeper of tradition, born to a family of wine-makers and educators who helped shape the Hebrew language. Her childhood memories remain etched in her mind: her grandmother's fig tree garden, where she daydreamed hundreds of afternoons; her father's collection of modern works, her precious herbaria. These memories now coalesce into a single yet timeless image that continues to guide Ms. Oxman's work and nourish her worldview. Initially drawn to medicine, Ms. Oxman studied at Hadassah Medical School, in Jerusalem. Later driven by a passion to build, she entered the Technion to study architecture and received her diploma from the Architectural Association in London where she was first introduced to digital design. Following a period of professional work in London, she journeyed to the States to complete her PhD at MIT under her mentor, the late Professor William J. Mitchell. Today, Ms. Oxman is MIT's Sony Corporation Career Development Professor of Media Arts and Sciences. While Nature is her muse, Ms. Oxman's medium is decidedly twenty-first-century. Using computer algorithms and digital fabrication technologies such as 3D printers, she transforms optimized shapes and environmental behaviors into three-dimensional forms and systems. "Can we emulate spongy formations in the bone to create highly optimized forms?" One need only view her creations to sense the breadth of her approach. For example, the experimental chaise lounge, ironically named "Beast" —designed in collaboration with Professor W. Craig Carter and fabricated by Stratasys—is printed out of eight materials of varying flexibility countering the body's pressure points. Ms. Oxman's work flows effortlessly across disciplines, be it materials science, computation, or fantastic zoology. Her multidisciplinary approach to design led her to develop the design field of Material Ecology, dedicated to establishing a "deeper, more scientific and precise relationship between the design object and its environment." Believing that the "age of the machine" is poised to give way to the "age of biology," she seeks to do away with assembly lines that have, for over a century, "dictated a world made of parts." To accelerate design practices into this new age, she founded, in 2010, the Mediated Matter group at the MIT Media Lab, where her research is at the intersection of biology, computational design, materials science and digital fabrication. Ms. Oxman's groundbreaking design approach and creations have attracted worldwide attention. Her Natural Artifice series, commissioned by MoMA and now in its permanent collection, embodies her unique approach to "form-finding." The Pompidou Centre acquired her work Imaginary Beings: Mythologies of the Not Yet, which represents the ancient myths through the lens of material expression, human augmentation and technology. Other notable Ms. Oxman venues include the Museum of Art and Design, the Smithsonian, the Museum of Fine Arts, as well as private collections. For her groundbreaking achievements Ms. Oxman was named "Revolutionary Mind" by SEED Magazine; one of ICON's top 20 most influential architects; and one of the 100 Most Creative People by Fast Company. She has received a 40 Under 40 Building Design + Construction Award, a Graham Foundation Carter Manny Award, the International Earth Award for Future-Crucial Design, and a METROPOLIS Next Generation Award. Hailed by WIRED as "Nature's Architect," Ms. Oxman continues to challenge the design and construction of objects, buildings, and systems, even those that seem unimaginable. Yet.

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