Professor David Bell to receive the David M. Darrin ’40 Counseling Award

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From Elise Budd (Class of 2015), President, Phalanx Leadership Honor Society

“We are pleased to announce that Dr. David Bell of the School of Architecture has been selected as the 41st recipient of the David M. Darrin ’40 Counseling Award.

This award was established by David M. Darrin ’40 to recognize a faculty member who has made an unusual contribution in the counseling of undergraduate students. The selection of the award recipient is made by Phalanx Honor Society based on nominations received from an open solicitation to the campus earlier this academic year. The David M. Darrin ’40 Counseling Award will be presented to Dr. Bell at Commencement on May 30, 2015.

In recognizing Professor Bell, members of the Rensselaer community cited his compassion and care for students, both personally and professionally. Dr. Bell shares his insight by delivering unique feedback to his students—cultivating original practices and thoughtful design methodologies. Dr. Bell has served as chairman of the Robert S. Brown ’52 Fellows Program selection committee, established to support global independent research for students within the Rensselaer architecture program. Through his exhaustive efforts, Professor Bell continues to generously share his time, knowledge, and resources to ensure a strong community within the School of Architecture.

Please join Phalanx in congratulating Dr. Bell on this honor.”

David Bell is an associate professor and faculty member of Rensselaer’s School of Architecture since 1980. He holds an M.Arch. degree from the University of Virginia, where he had also been in the Ph.D. program in physics before taking up the study of architecture. He has taught architectural design studio and a variety of courses in the history and theory of architecture at every level in Rensselaer’s undergraduate and graduate programs. His writings on the history and theory of architecture have been published in a variety of national and international journals. His most recent articles are “The Irritation of Architecture” in the Spring 2011 issue of the Journal of Architectural Education and “The Panoptic Garden”, which will appear in the book EARTH PERFECT? Nature, Utopia, and the Garden to be published by Black Dog Publications in spring 2012. Professor Bell is currently writing a series of books regarding the formative importance of constraints in the architectural creative process. The first three of these books will appear in 2012. Their titles are Bernini and Borromini: Theater & Heresy, Thomas Jefferson’s University of Virginia: Knowledge & the Middle Landscape, and Adolf Loos: The Irritation of Modernity.

Professor Bell recently returned from the India travel program of this spring.

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