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One of Japan's leading architects examines notions of Japan-ness as
exemplified by key events in Japanese architectural history from
the seventh to the twentieth century; essays on buildings and their
cultural context. Japanese architect Arata Isozaki sees buildings
not as dead objects but as events that encompass the social and
historical context-not to be defined forever by their "everlasting
materiality" but as texts to be interpreted and reread continually.
In Japan-ness in Architecture, he identifies what is essentially
Japanese in architecture from the seventh to the twentieth century.
In the opening essay, Isozaki analyzes the struggles of modern
Japanese architects, including himself, to create something
uniquely Japanese out of modernity. He then circles back in history
to find what he calls Japan-ness in the seventh-century Ise shrine,
reconstruction of the twelfth-century Todai-ji Temple, and the
seventeenth-century Katsura Imperial Villa. He finds the periodic
ritual relocation of Ise's precincts a counter to the West's
concept of architectural permanence, and the repetition of the
ritual an alternative to modernity's anxious quest for origins. He
traces the "constructive power" of the Todai-ji Temple to the
vision of the director of its reconstruction, the monk Chogen,
whose imaginative power he sees as corresponding to the
revolutionary turmoil of the times. The Katsura Imperial Villa,
with its chimerical spaces, achieved its own Japan-ness as it
reinvented the traditional shoin style. And yet, writes Isozaki,
what others consider to be the Japanese aesthetic is often the
opposite of that essential Japan-ness born in moments of historic
self-definition; the purified stylization-what Isozaki calls
"Japanesquization"-lacks the energy of cultural transformation and
reflects an island retrenchment in response to the pressure of
other cultures. Combining historical survey, critical analysis,
theoretical reflection, and autobiographical account, these essays,
written over a period of twenty years, demonstrate Isozaki's
standing as one of the world's leading architects and preeminent
architectural thinkers.
Now that you have begun to master spoken Japanese with the two
volumes of 'Japanese with Ease', and you want to learn how to write
this fascinating language, 'Writing Japanese with Ease' is the book
for you! You will learn the fundamentals of writing the characters
of traditional Japan, borrowed from Chinese (Kanji). The book
follows the 99 lessons of 'Japanese with Ease', presenting the
characters in order of appearance throughout the two volumes. The
book lists each Kanji with its radical, its number of strokes, the
different pronunciations of the character, and -- of course -- its
meaning. For development of your writing skills, the
stroke-by-stroke character lay-out will be very useful, teaching
you the rules of writing Kanji. Dont miss the useful appendices
such as the Table of Radicals, the Index listing Kanji by number of
strokes, as well as the dialogue texts of Japanese with Ease, given
in standard written Japanese.
Selected research projects and architecture exploring the role of
design within complex social, political and environmental
conditions Toshiko Mori is a New York-based architect and Professor
in the Practice of Architecture at the Harvard University Graduate
School of Design for many years. As a long-time member of the World
Economic Forum's Global Agenda Council on the Future of Cities,
Mori led research and inquiry into sustainable architecture,
enhancing cities' livability, and creating efficient urban
services. Mori is also on the board of Dassault Systems, a company
connecting technology to environment and life science. And she has
founded the platform VisionArc, a think tank dedicated to exploring
the role of design within complex social and environmental issues.
This book will focus on TMA's projects based on research, and the
impact of socially valuable projects to society. The book will
illustrate how the observation of the architect operates as opposed
to how the imagination of the architect manifests itself. Different
chapters in the book are describing various ways of approaching the
task of observation. Seven chapters are divided into specific
projects and provide a look at the hidden thought processes that
can take place behind the ideas, solutions, and physical
manifestations or architecture. Presented projects include the
Portable Concert Hall, called Paracoustica, which is an ongoing
nonprofit work to come up with an affordable and sharable concert
hall among many constituents in remote and underserved community;
the Novartis Institutes for BioMedical Research focusing on
socialization among scientists as a new model of work that promotes
further discovery and teamwork. And i.e. the research on the role
of libraries in the future using the example of the Brooklyn Public
Library Central Branch. Another chapter is dedicated to the
vernacular typology development in Senegal with the Albers
Foundation, and the research on social spaces for collaborative
educational environments.
The approach of "Informing Architecture by Materiality" opens the
way to an innovative use of materials in the design professions.
Taking material qualities and properties such as texture,
elasticity, transparency and fluidity as a point of departure, the
concept described and employed here transcends the conventional
definitions of building materials. Instead, the focus is on a
multitude of material operations, like folding and bending, carving
and cutting, weaving and knitting, mirroring and screening. The
featured design strategies and methods address established and
"new" materials alike. They are applied both to the scale of the
detail and the entire building. The examples comprise prototype
structures as well as large building projects. Eight chapters deal
with surfaces and layers, joints and juctions, weaving and
texturing, nanoscale transformations, responsiveness, the
integration of ephemeral factors like wind and light as well as
material collections providing professional resources. Written by
renowned experts in this field, the book features many examples
from international contemporary architecture. The introductory part
provides the conceptual background, while a final chapter describes
consequences for pressing issues of today, like sustainability or
life cycle assessment.
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