The Saga of Continuous Architecture
Yokohama International Port Terminal Competition 20th Anniversary
THE SAGA OF CONTINUOUS ARCHITECTURE
June 6 (Sat) 17:00-20:00
Arata Isozaki Keynote Lecture: System and Structure of “Wa” Spaces
The University of Tokyo Engineer Bldg.1 Lecture room 15
(Opens from 16:30, 100 seats maximum, Free admission)
– Arata Isozaki (Arata Isozaki & Associates)
– Eric Owen Moss (SCI-Arc, Eric Owen Moss Architects)
– Jeffrey Kipnis (The Ohio State University)
– Kengo Kuma (The University of Tokyo, Kengo Kuma & Associates)
– Yusuke Obuchi (The University of Tokyo)
June 7 (Sun) 10:00-16:30
Symposium: The Saga of Continuous Architecture
Yokohama International Port Terminal Osanbashi Hall
(Opens from 09:30, 800 seats maximum, Free admission)
Session 1: “Agile Topologies: bringing the ground to life”
– Alejandro Zaera-Polo (Princeton University, AZPML)
– Kunio Watanabe (Structural Design Group)
– Jesse Reiser (Princeton University, Reiser+Umemoto RUR Architecture)
– Nanako Umemoto (Columbia University, Reiser+Umemoto RUR Architecture)
– Jeffrey Kipnis (The Ohio State University)
Session 2: “The generalized calculated surface: The incredible, Lightness and Being”
– Kazuyo Sejima (SANAA)
– Mutsuro Sasaki (Hosei University, Sasaki and Partners)
– Hernan Diaz Alonso (SCI-Arc, XEFIROTARCH)
– Liam Young (Princeton University, Tomorrow’s Thoughts Today)
– Yusuke Obuchi (The University of Tokyo)
Conclusion
– Arata Isozaki (Arata Isozaki & Associates)
The occasion of the Yokohama International Port Terminal competition in 1995 was a watershed moment for the discipline of architecture in many respects. A new generation of architects and theorists across the globe seized it as a platform to explore emerging modalities in design, design technology, and delivery which would become the mediums through which and against which much of contemporary practice would play out. To understand this shift is to recognize that the Port Terminal project elicited changes not simply in one architectural register but across almost all of the disciplinary and sub-disciplinary categories that involve the conception and practice of design.
This symposium will reengage the Yokohama Terminal with neither nostalgia nor negativity. The symposium is designed to trace the birth and development of continuous architecture, a concept which became a basis for the design of the Yokohama Terminal. The symposium will also include a discussion of the influence of the project on current architectural practices and beyond.
