Wolf D. Prix

Wolf D. Prix is an Austrian architect, co-founder of the avant-garde architecture firm Coop Himmelblau. Founded in 1968 with Helmut Swiczinsky and Rainer Michael Holzer, the firm's name, meaning "Blue-Sky Cooperative," reflects their aim to make architecture light and fluctuating. In the 1970s, Prix and Swiczinsky experimented with designs that dematerialized conventional architecture through airy angles and complex spatial solutions, a process Prix likened to "drawing with one's eyes closed," similar to Dadaist and Surrealist techniques.1

By the 1980s, Coop Himmelblau's designs began to be built, characterized by bold, angular forms and open, complex spaces. Their work, such as the Rooftop Remodeling in Vienna (1983–88), was recognized in the 1988 Museum of Modern Art exhibition "Deconstructivist Architecture" for its deconstruction of Modernist principles. Later projects continued to challenge architectural norms, including the UFA Cinema Center in Germany and the BMW Welt in Munich.12