Filler Responds to Hadid Lawsuit

John Hill

26. August 2014

Zaha Hadid and Martin Filler. Photos: Wikimedia Commons

New York Review of Books architecture critic Martin Filler has issued a letter of regret just days after architect Zaha Hadid filed a lawsuit with the New York State Supreme Court in Manhattan.

Hadid's claim – Hadid v. NYRev Inc et al – asserts that Filler's June 5 review of Rowan Moore's Why We Build: Power and Desire in Architecture "falsely implied she was indifferent to the alleged difficult working conditions of migrant workers on high-profile construction projects in the Middle East, including her own." Filler's comments are based on quotes from Hadid – such as, "It's not my duty as an architect to look at it." – in regards to the deaths of construction workers in Qatar, where the Al Wakrah stadium she designed for the 2022 World Cup will be built.

Filler's retraction, published in full in the Guardian and behind a paywall on the NYRev's website (for the time being – the paper will publish the retraction online and in its August 28 issue), is as follows:

"To the Editors: In my review of Rowan Moore's Why We Build: Power and Desire in Architecture, I quoted comments by the architect Zaha Hadid, who designed the Al Wakrah stadium in Qatar, when she was asked in London in February 2014 about revelations a week earlier in the Guardian that hundreds of migrant laborers had died while working on construction projects in Qatar."I wrote that an 'estimated one thousand laborers … have perished while constructing her project thus far'.

"However, work did not begin on the site for the Al Wakrah stadium, until two months after Ms. Hadid made those comments; and construction is not scheduled to begin until 2015.

"There have been no worker deaths on the Al Wakrah project and Ms Hadid's comments about Qatar that I quoted in the review had nothing to do with the Al Wakrah site or any of her projects. I regret the error."

Hadid's lawsuit seeks damages, a halt to the review's continued publication, and a retraction. Filler's letter addresses the last of the three, but if the action is sufficient to appease Hadid is still to be determined. Hadid's lawyer, New York's Oren Warshavsky, says this in the Guardian article: "We are in receipt of Mr Filler's retraction issued today and aware of the New York Review of Books' plan to post it on their website. Ms Hadid together with counsel are reviewing it now and will respond after further careful consideration."