Four Facets of Contemporary Japanese Architecture: City (edX)

After the 1970s, Japanese architects are said to have stopped conceptualizing cities and instead focused on designing the individual buildings that make up the cities. However, as cities continue to undergo significant transformations in response to globalization, the advent of information technologies, and so on, Japanese architects are once again engaging the city, and doing so in unique ways.

This course on “City” will review the works of those architects who have attempted to conceptualize cities through their architecture and examine the changes over the last half century as well as the issues for the future. Fumihiko Maki, Itsuko Hasegawa, Riken Yamamoto, Kengo Kuma, Jun Aoki, and Atelier Bow-Wow (Yoshiharu Tsukamoto & Momoyo Kaijima) visit their buildings to discuss the ideas behind their respective works.

This course is part of the Four Facets of Contemporary Japanese Architecture XSeries Program.

What you'll learn

- Development of contemporary Japanese architecture since the 1964 Tokyo Olympics

- Features of works of influential Japanese architects

- How Japanese architects attempted to conceptualize cities through their architecture

- Present concerns and potential future directions for contemporary Japanese architecture