Hofer Prize winners announced

The 1972 Summer Olympics in Munich, marked by tragedy, are also known for being the first to incorporate a brand across all aspects of the games.

“The Munich games were really the first games to create a visual identity. And it was a visual and graphic identity that spoke to the new identity of West Germany,” said Matthew Gin. “This was important because it was the first games held in Germany after World War II.”

Gin, a Ph.D. candidate in architecture, was this year’s first place winner in the Philip Hofer Prize for Collecting. His collection “Between West Germany and the World: Design at the 1972 Munich Olympics” was deemed outstanding by the judges who evaluated this year’s entries.

The annual prize, open to all Harvard students, is named for Philip Hofer, ’21, a former curator of Houghton Library. The awards are given to students whose collection of books or works of art fulfill “the traditions of breadth, coherence and imagination” exemplified by Hofer. According to Hope Mayo, Philip Hofer Curator of Printing and Graphic Arts and one of the judges who evaluated the entries, this year’s Hofer Prize competition attracted such a strong field the judges decided to award not only a first prize of $2,000, but also two second prizes of $1,000 each, and two third prizes of $500 each.

This year’s prize winners were recently recognized at a ceremony at Houghton prior to the Philip Hofer Lecture on April 16.