Kengo Kuma was born in Yokohama, Kanagawa Prefecture in 1954. After graduating from the University of Tokyo in 1979, he continued his studies at Columbia University for two more years, and already in 1987 he founded his own studio, which is now called Kengo Kuma & Associates. The architect opened a Paris studio in 2008.
Stone Museum
His creative vision is based on the emotional component of materials, his connection with construction technologies and traditional Japanese spiritual teachings - no matter how strange it may sound to a European.
Kengo Kuma
Kuma himself says that he strives to fine-tune the material, year after year "seriously criticizing modern methods of concrete construction and striving to find an alternative to the concrete that dominates this field."
Ando Hiroshige Museum in Nasu
To understand the philosophical depths hidden in his architecture, it is necessary to get acquainted with his Museum of Stone (2000) and the Ando Hiroshige Museum (of the same period) in Nasu, with the openwork stone structure of Tokkura Plaza in Takanezawa (2006), the Santori Museum in Tokyo (2007). All of these are small, chamber objects that disrupt the usual architectural discourse with its glass, steel and concrete arguments.
Tokkura Plaza in Takanezawa
Santori Museum in Tokyo
In the book "Anti-Object: The Decomposition and Disintegration of Architecture" (2008), Kuma criticizes the excessive "objectification" that pervades Western architecture and thereby prevents "establishing a healthy relationship with the outside world." At the same time, he offers "an alternative form of architecture - one that should be preferred, and one that is possible."
In addition to wood and natural stone, the architect suggests using an alternative: ceramics, bamboo, plastic and vinyl.
The center of tourism in Tokyo
Close attention to the role of natural light in architecture is symptomatic of Kuma's work. It allows you to achieve a feeling of extreme "spatial immateriality" of a physical object created from completely tangible materials. Such are his "Plastic House" (2002) and the Tourism Center in Tokyo (2012), as well as the FRAC - Fonds Régional D'art Contemporain (2012) building in Marseille with translucent glass "second skin" on the facades.
The FRAC building is the Fonds Régional D'art Contemporain in Marseille
Kuma's work also touches on sequence: his buildings involve a whole range of different spatial experiences. Their appearance changes during the day, with the change of seasons and weather conditions. Despite the incredibly seductive visual image, Kengo Kuma's architecture, with its nuances and subtleties, must be experienced and experienced in its physical embodiment, not through photographs.
Zuishoji Temple in Tokyo, 2019
Kengo Kuma: “Illustration can only convey a fixed visual image, whereas for me architecture is the whole spatial experience as a whole. It can include touch or smell—anything that involves a special connection.”
