At the IASS Annual Symposium held in Melbourne, Australia, the following distinguished honors were formally conferred:

• Eduardo Torroja Medal for Matsuro SASAKI (Japan)
  
• IASS Honorary Membership for Michael Valentin BALZ (Germany)
• IASS Isler Prize for Janet ECHELMAN (USA)

The last is the first award of the recently established IASS Isler Prize described at https://iass-structures.org/Isler-Prize/.

At the annual meeting of the IASS Executive Council held on 9 July 2023, the following honor was approved and announced for conferral at the 2024 Annual Symposium in Zurich, Switzerland:

IASS Honorary Membership for David M. CAMPBELL (USA)

The annual Executive Council meeting was held on Sunday, July 9, one day before the start of the 2023 Annual Symposium in Melbourne.

The Executive Council approved the results of the annual election by the membership for renewal of one third of the IASS Executive Council and seated the following for 3-year terms:

• Sigrid ADRIAENSSENS (re-elected)
  
• Kai-Uwe BLETZINGER (re-elected)
• Tomohiro TACHI (re-elected)
• Toru TAKEUCHI (re-elected)
• Yi Min "Mike" XIE (previously co-opted)
• Jinzhi WU (newly elected)

In addition, at the meeting, the EC co-opted the following to 3-year terms:

• Emily BAKER (newly co-opted as Chair of the Communications Committee)
• William BAKER (previously elected, now co-opted to break tie in election)

And the following former EC members were elected to the Advisory Board:

• Niels De Temmerman (chair of Working Group 15)
• Juan Gerardo OLIVA SALINAS (former Vice President and former Chair of the Membership Committee)
  

For IASS members, access to the PDF of the full issue is through the Publications Gateway of this website. The issue will be available soon on the Ingenta website in the usual form.

This is a special issue prepared by IASS Working Group 8: Metal Spatial Structures with guest editors Toru Takeuchi, Su-Duo Xue and Shiro Kato and consisting of a preface and 12 technical papers.

Also included is a memorial statement for Horst Berger (1928-2019), a pioneering designer of fabric tension structures and an IASS Torroja Medalist.

The IASS regrets to report the death of IASS Honorary Member N.K. Srivastava on April 21. He was an IASS member since the early 1970s, was a long-time member of the Executive Council 1990-2012, was Vice President 2003-2012, and was conferred Honorary Membership in 2014. His significant service to the Association included membership of the Editorial Committee since 1983, Scientific Chair and Organizer of the 1992 IASS Symposium in Toronto, Chair of TAC 1993-2003, and Chair of Honors & Awards 2006-2012. He was also IASS representative to SEWC and Vice President of the SEWC Board for many years.

For IASS members, access to the PDF of the full issue is through the Publications Gateway of this website. The issue will be available soon on the Ingenta website in the usual form.

The ICCT 2023 Conference, co-organized by IASS Working Group 3 and originally scheduled for October 2023 in Shanghai, has been cancelled by the local host and organizing committee.

Now, balloting for the IASS Executive Council Elections 2023, and General Assembly Referendum 2022 is open on the Association website

from March 01 (00:00 CET) through March 31 (24:00 CET).

After logging in, select MEMBER TOOLS from the top menu and then BALLOTING.

Only Individual, Senior and Distinguished Members as well as Collective Representatives and Chapter Representatives are eligible to vote.

The following membership levels are not eligible to vote:
Student, Awardee, Chapter affiliates, Collective affiliates

Early this year, security enhancements to underlying software inadvertently interrupted the ability of IASS members to log into the Ingenta websites hosting issues of the Journal of the IASS and the Proceedings of Annual IASS Symposia. As of 10 February, this full online access for members has been restored through the "Publications Gateway for IASS Members" page of the website (but members already logged in may need to reload the page before selecting Ingenta access).

Distinguished Member Horst Berger died in May 2019. Because no obituary was published, the IASS has only belatedly learned of Berger's passing. He was a well known contributor to the field of long-span tension and membrane structures, including the Hajj Terminal in Saudi Arabia and the roof the the Denver International Airport. His Wikipedia page is https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Horst_Berger. A memorial statement will appear in a future issue of the Journal of the IASS.