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Month: June 2015

“SMALL ARCHITECTURE FOR TOKYO OLYMPICS & PARALYMPICS 2020”

The 2015 SPL pavilion will soon be complete. The structure is made out of carbon fiber strand rods and spandex (a stretchable membrane). There will be an opening event on July 15. The event is all about the possibility of carbon fiber as architectural material for the 2020 Tokyo Olympics and Paralympics.

http://kumalab.blogspot.jp/2015/06/715.html

June 8, 2015: Lecture “Shaken, not Stirred” by Hernan Diaz Alonso, SCI-Arc

On June 8, 2015, we had the pleasure of inviting Hernan Diaz Alonso, the next director of SCI-Arc, to present his lecture entitled “Shaken not Stirred.”




Biography:
Hernan Diaz Alonso is Principal of the Los Angeles-based architecture office Xefirotarch. His multidisciplinary practice is praised for work at the intersection of design, animation, interactive environments and radical exploration of architecture. Over the course of his career as an architect and educator, Diaz Alonso has earned accolades for his leadership and innovation, as well as his ability to build partnerships among varied constituencies.

June 6, 2015: Keynote Lecture by Arata Isozaki on “The SAGA of Continuous Architecture”, co-hosted with SCI-Arc

On June 6, 2015, we were delighted to have Arata Isozaki for a Keynote Lecture on “The Saga of Continuous Architecture,” co-hosted with SCI-Arc.


Facilitated by Jeffrey Kipnis, Kuma Kengo presented his recent works centered around the topic of structures, and Eric Owen Moss paid homage to the importance Isozaki played in contemporary architecture. This was followed by a panel discussion. We would also like to thank Thomas Daniell, from University of Saint Joseph in Macau, for interpreting Mr. Isozaki’s words.

June 6, 2015: Lecture “City Everywhere: Kim Kardashian and the Dark Side of the Screen” by Liam Young

On June 6, 2015, it was our pleasure to invite Liam Young to present us with his lecture entitled “City Everywhere: Kim Kardashian and the Dark Side of the Screen.”

Lecture Summary:
Our luminous technologies cast shadows that stretch across the planet. Join speculative architect Liam Young and a fictional Kim Kardashian as they go on a storytelling walking tour through the flickering screen and beyond the fog of the cloud, to explore the distant landscapes, factories and infrastructures that our contemporary digital gadgets set in motion. With spoken word and a rapid fire assault of film, animation and live sound mixing Liam and Kim journey through City Everywhere, an imaginary town of near future technologies stitched together from fragments of real places, extreme mega cities and speculative design fictions.



Biography:
Liam Young is an architect who operates in the spaces between design, fiction and futures. He is founder of the think tank Tomorrows Thoughts Today, a group that explores the possibilities of fantastic, speculative and imaginary urbanism. He co-runs the “Unknown Fields Division,” a nomadic studio that travels on expeditions behind the scenes of the modern city.

June 5, 2015: Lecture by Alejandro Zaera-Polo at Shimizu Corporation, co-hosted with Keio University

On June 5, 2015, we were honored to co-host a lecture by Alejandro Zaera-Polo in collaboration with Keio University.

Alejandro Zaera-Polo is the co-founder of Alejandro Zaera-Polo & Maider Llaguno Architecture, an international practice based in London, Barcelona & Zurich. He was a founding partner of London-based Foreign Office Architects. His award-winning projects include the Yokohama International Cruise Terminal in Japan, which is noted for the interplay of architecture, landscape and infrastructure. Among his notable projects are the Birmingham New Street Station Redevelopment, the Ravensbourne College of Design and Communication in the United Kingdom, the Carabanchel social housing project in Madrid, the Meydan retail complex and multiplex in Istanbul, the Spanish Pavilion at the 2005 International Expo in Aichi, Japan, and the Dulnyouk Publishing headquarters in Paju, South Korea. Zaera-Polo has received many prestigious honors for his work, including the Enric Miralles Prize for Architecture, five RIBA awards from the Royal Institute of British Architects, the Venice Architecture Biennale Award and the Charles Jencks Award for Architecture.
While maintaining his international practice, Zaera-Polo has played a significant role in the academic discipline of architecture. In addition to his teaching at Princeton, he has served as dean of the Berlage Institute in Rotterdam, and currently occupies the Berlage Chair at the Delft University of Technology in the Netherlands and the Norman R. Foster Visiting Professorship of Architectural Design at Yale University. As a theorist, his writing has appeared in international publications such as El Croquis, Quaderns, A+U, Arch+, Volume and Log. His writings are collected in “The Sniper’s Log” published by ACTAR, Barcelona in 2013. 

June 2, 2015: Lectures entitled “Points of Inflection” and “The Task of the Translator” by Thomas Daniell

On June 2 and 3, 2015, we were very fortunate to have Thomas Daniell from the University of Saint Joseph in Macau join us for a two-part lecture event. 

The first lecture by Thomas was entitled “Points of Inflection.”

The second lecture was presented under the theme of “The Task of the Translator.”

Many students attended the lectures and they were followed by lively rounds of Q&A. Good times were had by all. Please join us next time. 

Joint-Workshop with Princeton

Every year, T_ADS and Princeton School of Architecture organize joint-workshops for cross-exchange of architectural history, theory and concepts. This year, the joint-workshops centered around the theoretical texts by Hiroshi Hara, Arata Isozaki, and Fumihiko Maki, followed by student visits to their office and intimate interviews. The scenes below are from the reading group discussion before visiting the architects.