Exhibition Kazunari Sakamoto

Gallery of Critics, Embassy of Japan in the Czech Republic, The Kazunari Sakamoto Architectural Laboratory of the Tokyo Institute of Technology, Deutscher Werkbund Bayern e.V. and The Japan Foundation present an exhibition:

KAZUNARI SAKAMOTO:
HOUSES - POETRY OF THE EVERYDAY

Exhibition from 21.11.2005 - 18.12.2005
Tuesday - Sunday, 11 AM - 6 PM
Exhibition opening on 21.11.2005 at 6 PM

Lecture by architect Sakamoto on 21.11.2005 at 4:30 PM

Lecture at FA VUT Brno on 18.11.2005 at 11 AM

Kazunari Sakamoto (1943) is one of the most important Japanese architects dealing with residential buildings. The exhibition in the Gallery of Critics presents his work in Prague for the first time. The exhibition was organized in cooperation with Deutscher Werkbund Bayern e.V. and The Japan Foundation. The exhibition includes 18 models of residential houses, 20 large-format photographs, planning documentation, and projections.
Holder of the “Togo Murano Award” and “The Architectural Institute of Japan Award,” and a follower of architect Kazuo Shinohara at the Tokyo Institute of Technology, he has been exploring "ordinariness" for 35 years. Discovering beauty in the everyday is a central theme of Buddhist aesthetics, which finds such significant application in Japan.
The houses of architect Sakamoto are the materialization of “that overlooked independent world in the depth of the mundane.” These multilayered buildings do not refer, in contrast to the perfectly smooth concrete surfaces of Tadao Ando, to classical aesthetic concepts. These buildings are pragmatic yet simultaneously intricately thought out. Seemingly trivial, raw, or imperfect, they respond only to their immediate environment. They pose the fundamental question regarding our individual and social standards. In a stunning unity, architect Sakamoto achieves spatial openness that goes far beyond transparency: The multitude of possibilities and perspectives offered within his buildings shapes a sense of what is yet to come.
As a teacher, Kazunari Sakamoto has a defining influence on the youngest generation of architects in Tokyo. His work has long been associated with the application and discussion of philosophical theses on architecture by the Japanese philosopher Koji Taki.
Kazunari Sakamoto will personally introduce his Prague exhibition with a lecture on 21.11. at 4:30 PM. The exhibition will open with the architect's participation at 6 PM.
The lecture at FA VUT in Brno will take place on 18.11. 2005 at 11 AM!
On the occasion of the opening of the exhibition at Modern Pinakothek in Munich (2004-2005), a catalog was published in German and English. More information can also be found in the latest issue of the architectural magazine Era 21 (No. 05/2005).