What distinguishes an "artist" from an "architect"? (Author: Amin Abdel-Kader) The differences are as diverse as the people involved and the contexts in which they operate. The question should rather be, what do artists and architects have in common? According to the Civil Engineers Act, architects are particularly entitled to plan monumental buildings, theatres, museum buildings and churches, provided they are important from an artistic, cultural or social point of view. In contrast to other civil engineers, consulting engineers or master builders (commercial architects), the role of architects is defined by their artistic contribution to the planning of construction projects. Accordingly, it is only architecture if it is architecture. Building without art may serve a purpose, but not the meaning. Building without aesthetics is like eating without flavour. Everything is architecture Hans Hollein (1967): "Limited definitions and traditional definitions of architecture and its means have largely lost their validity today. Our endeavours are directed towards the environment as a whole and all the media that determine it. Television and artificial climate, transport and clothing, the telephone and housing. The expansion of the human sphere and the means of determining the environment goes far beyond a structural statement ..." to conclude: "Everyone is an architect. Everything is architecture." BAU: Schrift für Architektur und Städtebau, 23rd year, issue 1/2, Vienna 1968 Every person is an artist Joseph Beuys (1976): "Art is the image of man himself. In other words, when people are confronted with art, they are basically confronted with themselves. He then opens his own eyes. So the creative human being, his creativity, his freedom, his autonomy is addressed. And that is only possible from the concept of art, but then you have to expand it. You cannot and must not keep it so traditional and say: artists do this and engineers do that. But you can break through that. And the only way out is through an expanded concept of art that is anthropological, that really takes seriously that every person is an artist, that there is a creative core in every person." Exhibition Hamburger Bahnhof, Berlin 2006