Part 1 – Tadao Andō
Tadao Andō was born in Osaka, Japan the day 13th September of the year 1941. What makes him so interesting is that he never recieved classes in an architecture school, but in the Art School of Osaka. In fact, he extended all his knowledge in a autodidact way, just reading and travelling troughout Europe, Africa and the United States.
In his designs, Andō avoid the actual standar rules and he points to more minimalistic ideas, always trying to provoke positive emotions trought the use of spaces, light and water. He also focuses into solving the existing urban caos of the big cities in Japan.
His work along almost 40 years granted him a Pritzker Prize in 1995. Between his most important buildings stand out:
Azuma House (Osaka, Japan)
Pulitzer Foundation (San Luis, Misuri)
Museum of Modern Art (Fort Worth, Texas)
Rokko Dwellings (Hyogo, Japan)
Naoshima’s Contemporary Art Museum (Kagawa, Japan)
I think architecture really turns interesting when it shows its double character: the most simplicity posible, and at the same time, all the complexity that can be endowed to it.
Tadao Andō
This quote reflects Tadao’s perception of architecture to perfection. I can perfectly understand what he means just by seeing his projects. The way he uses simple shapes to create more complex sets is what gives his buildings that special character. Simplicity to the eye but complexity of concepts, that’s how I would describe his work. In fact, I feel really inspired by his understanding of the discipline and I will surely apply it in future works.
Bibliography:
Part 2 – Text “Quiero ser arquitecto”
The text “Quiero ser arquitecto” shows us a global sight of the vast world of Architecture from the point of view of an experienced professional. He, Campo Baeza, gives us his opinion of everything related to that field and I found his reflections very interesting while reading the text. He treat the reader as an potential architecture student, but we are already studying the degree. Anyway, I had fun imagining I was 4 years ago, with no idea that I would like to study architecture, and letting this text to convince me to enter the degree.
The part I found more interesting of the whole text is when the author’s speech about what is an architect. He says an architect is a dreamer, an artist and a technician and I completely agree with the three descriptions.
The first facet, the one of a dreamer, is related to the relation the writer creates between dreaming about a building or have an idea in mind and executing it in reality. This is a right guess because building don’t come from nothing, they come from an existing concept haunting around the architect’s head.
The second one, the one of being an artist, was already treated in the first practice exercise. There we talked about the different aspects that gave architecture that artistic character, and its relation with other art disciplines such as music or sculpture.
And about the last one, it is obvious that that relation between dreams and reality couldn’t be possible without the needed technical knowledge. Indeed, there are many architects that forget about this part of the matter and focus on the design. But what is the purpose of designing any building if you’re unable to bring it to reality.