Test your design IQ
MANILA, Philippines -Who is this Pritzer Prize winning Japanese architect who designed the Hiroshina Peace Memorial, and buildings for the 1960 Tokyo Olympics and 1970 Osaka Expositon?
He was born of Sept. 4, 1913 in Osaka, Japan, and spent his early life in the Chinese cities of Hankow and Shanghai. His family returned to Japan when they learned of the death of one of their uncles.
After attending middle school he moved to Hiroshima in 1930 to attend high school. It was there the he first encountered the works of the Swiss modernist Lwe Corbusier. His discovery of the drawings of the Palace of the Soviets inspired him to become an architect.
In 1935, he began his studies in architecture in the University of Tokyo, where his graduation project was a 17-hectare development set in Tokyo´s Hibiya Park.
After graduating from the university, he started to work in the architectural office of Kunio Maekewa, where he traveled to Manchuria participating in an architectural design competition for a bank and toured Jehol on his return.
When World War II started, he joined the University of Tokyo as a postgraduate student, where he developed an interest in urban design. During that time, he was awarded first prize for the design of the Greater East Asian Co Prosperity Sphere Memorial Hall, where he was awarded first prize.
His interest in urban studies put him in a good position to handle post war reconstruction. In 1946, he was invited by the War Damage Rehabilitation Board to put forward a proposed design for certain war damaged cities.
He was awarded first prize for the design of the Hirsohima Peace memorial, where he proposed a museum whose axis runs through teh park, intersecting Peace Boulevard, and the atomic bomb dome. The building is raised on massive columns, which frame the views along the structure´s axis
His later works like the Ise Shrine, the Kagawa Prefectorial Government Hall, the Town Hall in Kurashiki, as well as his own home gave him renown both in Japan in abroad. The latter was based on the traditional Japanese module of the tatami mat, with the largest rooms designed to have flexibility so that these can be separated into three small rooms by sliding doors.
He also designed the gymnasium and swimming pool for the 1960 Tokyo Olympics and the Festival Plaza of the Osaka Exposition in 1970.
In the 1970s and the 1980s, he built buildings in over 20 countries around the world. In 1985, Jacques Chirac, then the Mayor of Paris, asked him to propose a master plan that would interconnect the city along the east west axis.
He won numerous prizes including US AIA Gold Medal in 1966, the Prtizker Prize in 1987. He received an Order of Merit from the Federal Republic of Germany in 1976 and the Knight of the Legion of Honor of France in 1996. He died on March 22, 2005.
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Last week’s question: Who is the 20th century Hungarian painter, photographer, and industrial designer best known for his light prop for an electric stage?
Answer: Lazlo Moholy-Nagy
Winner: Marciano Fidel L. Avendano of Sta. Ana, Manila
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Text your answer to 0915-6486414 with your name and address. One winner will be chosen through a raffle of texts with the correct answer. The winner will receive P2,000 worth of SM gift certificates for use at Our Home, SM Department Store, or SM Supermarket. They can claim their prize at Our Home in SM Megamall. Call the store manager at 634-1943. Bring photocopies of two valid IDs and a clipping of the Design Quiz issue in which you appear as winner.
