• Journal of architectural history
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• v.9 no.2 s.23
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• pp.49-63
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• 2000

In this research, we analyzed the activities of Japanese architectural offices in Korea during the Japanese occupation era, classifying them into two groups: first, Japanese architectural offices that had their bases in Korea, and second, Japanese architectural offices that had their bases in Japan. There were totally 98 Japanese architectural offices that had their bases in Korea during the Japanese occupation period. The number of those offices had increased rapidly since 1920s. Nakamura(the design of bank buildings), Tamada(the design of theaters), Otsumi(the design of Japanese style residential houses) can be regarded as the most remarkable Japanese architectural offices among them. We found that these offices already specialized in certain architectural planning fields, such as bank buildings, theaters and residential houses. It was also found that, during the Pacific War period, even privately-managed architectural offices were mobilized for the war by Japanese government, through designing munitions factories, etc. On the one hand, since some large Japanese corporations entered into Korea, many Japanese architectural offices, that had their bases in Japan, got into working in Korea and designed a number of buildings, with the exception of the architectural office of Vories, who was a Christian architect. Even though the place that the activities of these Japanese architectural offices were carried out was Korea, any factors of Korean architectural style couldn't be found In their works. This means that they just transplanted the Japanese modern architectural style in Korea.

• Korean Institute of Interior Design Journal
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• v.24 no.6
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• pp.119-127
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• 2015

Sou Fujimoto is well known as the 3rd Japanese architect to participate in the Serpentine Pavilion project, especially youngest of all architects. His projects seem very experimental yet inviting, modern yet comforting and these feeling may be resulted in his metaphor of 'Forest' that is very often mentioned in his writings which originally comes from his personal experience of the city and nature. The purpose of this paper is to understand the Fujimoto's metaphor of 'Forest' and design language he uses to express this very idea. The researchers have analyzed Fujimoto's writings and interviews in order to understand his general design ideas and process, then extracted wordings describing 'Forest' in his works. Four main concepts were found and categorized as follows: blurring territorial boundaries, proliferation of parts, manipulating spatial relationships, and ambiguity in function. Then two or three projects were selected and analyzed in each category to understand design methods used. The results show that Fujimoto enjoys using gradation of density to blur territorial boundaries in order to express ambiguous outline of forest, and fractal reproductions in proliferation of parts to uses express wavering whole and modifying angles in manipulating spatial relationships to show hidden order.

• Journal of architectural history
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• v.21 no.6
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• pp.35-44
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• 2012

This paper aimed at investigating into the origin and meaning of the Japanese architect Terunobu Fujimori's 'piercing column', and drew a conclusion as follows. First, the piercing column that made its first appearance in his architect debut work Jinchokan Moriya Historical Museum (1991) was conceived unexpectedly from pencil lines on a sketch that went through over the building's roof. And the tree-like natural treatment of the column's surface was influenced by Takamasa Yoshizaka's description of a Mongolian mud-house. Second, most of piercing columns in his later works have nothing to do with a structural role as in Jinchokan, but were designed for a visual effect and as a symbolic gesture. Again, they allude to a tree in nature through a roughly peeling treatment of the surface. Third, considering his ideas in History of Humankind and Architecture (2005), his column could be related to a universal origin of architecture and a symbol of the sun-god faith, and in particular to independent columns of Japanese Shito shrines, such as 'Onbashira' in Suwa and 'Iwanebashira' in Izumo. That is to say, the Fujimori column is a medium that implies the animistic nature-faith of Japan. Nevertheless, Fujimori's naturalism hints at a disquieting quality through an intentional artificiality and a provocative conflict between structure and finish of a building, which might be one aspect of the modern condition, 'uncanny'.

• Journal of architectural history
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• v.21 no.1
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• pp.135-154
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• 2012

The goal of this paper is to analyze the Freedom Center Apacle in Seoul designed by Kin Soo Geun who was a leading architect in Korean Modern architecture. Freedom Center was built in 1963, that was the largest monumental building to support military regime during cold war period in Korea. This paper deals with historical background of construction of Freedom Center and its characteristics compared to similar monumental buildings, especially Corbusier's Chandigar and Kenzo Tange's Hiroshima Peace Center. The Monumentality in Freedom Center came from the reference to these two buildings and its site plan. This paper tried to show how similar the layout of buildings between the Freedom Center and Peace Center. The origin of the sublime aura in Tange's linear layout of Peace Center is from Japanese Famous Shrine(Jinku). Kim translated it to serve the ideological purpose to protect from socialist regime in the name of freedom. Its over-scaled roof and weak contents showed Freedom center was a kind of theaterical setting belong to formalist building. But in spite of its symbolic and representational gesture its also had a architectonic physical quality to make it a monument. The change and duration in time testified the autonomous power of architecture in Freedom Center. Freedom Center was also important for using the exposed concrete and its superior finish. It was influenced not from western way of Benton Brut which was usually called New Brutalism but Japanese way of treating expose concrete. In spite of its limits Freedom center achieved new trend and sensibility in Korean Modern Architecture.

• Korean Institute of Interior Design Journal
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• v.24 no.4
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• pp.14-22
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• 2015

This study deals with a comparative analysis of wooden assembly methods between Japanese traditional architecture and Kuma, Kengo's works. Kuma, Kengo has known as an architect who pursues Japanese architectural traditions with integrated solutions for built and natural environments, and expresses a deep commitment to unexpected use of materials such as stone and wood with the clarity of structural solutions. Accordingly, his architecture focuses on the appreciation of the spatial relationship with the surrounding, its local characters, and the selection of materials. This article first examines two of wooden assembly methods that have been shown in Japanese traditional architecture such as 'two-way system' and 'one-way system'. And then, Kuma, Kengo's wooden assembly methods in his works are analyzed and compared in relation to Japanese wooden assembly methods to find out similarities and differences between them. Then, it concludes that Kuma, Kengo's approach is not only relying on the methods of Japanese traditional architecture, but also exploring creative ways beyond traditional assembly methods.

• Korean Institute of Interior Design Journal
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• v.23 no.4
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• pp.72-82
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• 2014

The Contemporary paradigm to understand the complexity and diversity is moving to 'Becoming' that taken place in reviewing at the relation of various concepts. In Japan, After the collapse of modern architecture has been declared 'Metabolism' was appeared. They tried to apply organism's metabolic system to buildings based on ecological thoughts. But Metaboilsm's projects had revealed limitations of representation that the city on the mechanical system became a huge scale. As a result, It caused a break the cultural context of the region in Japan. After then, Japanese Architects expressed a pluralistic aspects of modern society for the restoration of disconnected cultural context. From this perspective, The thought of 'becoming' is a new role for Contemporary Japanese Architect. This research is focused of projects of SANAA, Ito Toyo, Sou Fujimoto, because they have spatial thought about realizing the space through the ways organizing the various potential possibilities in the simple external form not stimulated. They are realize the 'becoming-space' within the architecture. This 'becoming-space' gives people in building the new characteristics and experience that potential interactions among user, architecture and nature. It is non-representational space not fixed, but changing organically and variably.

• Journal of architectural history
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• v.28 no.2
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• pp.53-64
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• 2019

This study examines the restoration project of Sokkuram, and introduces its preliminary plans by the architect Pai Ki Hyung. The restoration project started in 1958 with an inquiry committee of the restoration project, and was completed in 1964. Despite having undergone extensive repair work under Japanese supervision from 1913 and 1923, the repair work caused water leakages inside Sokkuram, and regular cleaning work that began in 1933 caused a lot of damage to the sculpture. In result of the surveys, the top priority of this project was to protect the sculptures inside Sokkuram by improving the environment of the cave. At that time, the architect Mr. Pai participated as a head of the fourth field surveyors to plan the restoration project and to design the preliminary plans. He proposed the installation of a double dome structure to prevent further water leakages on the concrete addition that was built up around the grotto by the Japanese. However, in 1961, the Cultural Heritage Committee of Korea examined the plans of Mr. Pai and immediately rejected them. The factors of the rejection were the omitting of entrance design, system of new double dome structure that presses the existing structure, and these changes that had to be made outside of the drainage plans. The repair work of Sokkuram began in 1961, and the main construction was building double dome structure and entrance installation. In this we realize that Mr. Pai's double dome structure plans were very important key concept of this project. This study attempts to demonstrate the double dome installations that Mr. Pai initially proposed, which ultimately remains as emblematic factors of Sokkuram's legacy.

• Journal of architectural history
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• v.2 no.1 s.3
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• pp.54-73
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• 1993

This study focuses on the staffs of the Governmental Organization of Construction who actually led this organization. Two main points of this study are as follows; 1) The composition and appointment of staffs, before and after the Korea-Japan Treaty in 1907, are evaluated, and 2) The working and academic career of each personnel are analyzed in connection with understanding of internal characteristics of this organization. Special attention is given to Korean personel and Japanese engineers who undertook a leading role. Korean engineering staffs were very few in number. It is thought, viewing their records of careers, that almost all of them didn't have any engineering basis, and simply they had some relations to Japan. It is certain that their role in this organization was interpreters using their Japanese language ability, and their roles were only limited to non-technical areas, if any. The early engineers from Japan were selected among the officials with comparatively rich careers of the Temporary Architectural Dept. or the Temporary Engineering Dept. of Custom House in Japan. But, in later days, the quality of Japanese engineers changed to the level of premature without practical experiences who unwillingly came to Korea to have a job under the depression of construction economy of Japan. The academic careers of Japanese engineers were various, from self-taught to regural college education, but the leading engineers were from Tokyo University. The civil engineers became high-level technical officials in the Government-General after the Japanese Annexation of Korea. But, sometimes later, many of the architectural engineers became practicing architect managing design offices on private basis.

• Journal of the Architectural Institute of Korea Planning & Design
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• v.34 no.12
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• pp.39-48
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• 2018

In modern architecture, the concept is the central axis of the design process, but it is not yet a building. The concept is modified in the process of realization because it captures only a part of reality. However, in the works of some Japanese architects, the concept seems to have become almost a building. In this study, I tried to find the cause of such a contradictory situation centering on House N of Fujimoto Sou, which is a representative architect of such tendency. Specifically, I analyzed the concept of House N by dividing it into aspects of function and representation. The reason for this was to see if the functional aspects of the concept were not modified in the first place, or if the representational aspects of the concept covered the functional aspects. For this purpose, I used WLVAE, which is a visual analysis tool, to analyze the functions of design concepts, along with the analysis of photographs, drawings, and diagrams. As a result of the analysis, House N was also modified to conditions of reality in the process of building, but the initial purity was emphasized in the representation of the concept, so that the building seemed to be very conceptual. This fact suggests that the architect has divided the functional and representational aspects of the concept and has focused on the latter. In conclusion this can be seen as an expression of the architect's interpretation of the relationship between the house and the city through the building.

• The Journal of Art Theory & Practice
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• no.9
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• pp.59-91
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• 2010

The Bauhaus educational method gave the strong influences on Modern Japanese art and design education. In the 1920s and 1930s, Japan allied with Germany and Italy politically and tried to receive German system to be modernized. The reception of the Bauhaus and Moholy-Nagy's photographic theory was one of those activities at that time. Japanese intellectual class went to the Bauhaus and studied there; Ishimoto Kikuchi, Nakata Sadanosuke, Mijutani Takehiko, Yamawaki Iwao and Yamawaki Michiko(Yamawaki Iwao's wife). Especially, Yamawaki Iwao studied about the architecture at the Bauhaus, but his interest moved toward the photography and the photomontage based on Moholy-Nagy's theory. He studied at the photography workshop of the Bauhaus presented by Peterhans irregularly. Even though Yamawaki Iwao was an architect, he wanted to be admitted as an expert for the photomontage that he particularly studied at the Bauahus as a Bauhaus member. He had presented many articles about the photomontage at the photography magazines in Japan in order to introduce it to Japan since he returned in 1933. Thus, Yamawaki Iwao is the important person when we look back the Modern Japanese design and art history. In Japan, the art and design systems are managed by the Bauhaus educational system until now, and it has become a kind of cultural legacy in Modern Japan; The university of Tama and The university of Tsukuba are the representative educational systems which are based on the Bauhaus legacy. However, Yamawaki Iwao had been concealed as a photographer in Japanese design and photography history until the retrospective discuss named by 'Bauhaus syashin(Bauhaus Photographies)' at the photography magazine, Deja-vu in 1995 and the retrospective exhibition titled as 'Bauhaus syashin(bauahustofografie)' in 1997. This study rethinks of Yamawaki Iwao's historical position while looking at the term as 'Bauhaus Syashin(Bauhaus Photographies)' used in Japan. It is very important to bear in mind Moholy-Nagy's wide variety of approaches to photography at the Bauhaus, but it is impossible to name it 'Bauhaus style'. 'Bauhaus style' is the international style in architecture, but that was never a Bauhaus style in photography. Eugene J. Prakapas indicated that the vague term of 'Bauhaus Photographies' in his article in 1985 as well. This study considers the historical background for the mistake of the term of 'Bauhaus Syashin(Bauhaus Photographies)' in Modern Japanese history, while looking at Yamawaki Iwao's photomontage faintly entering on the historical stage again to discuss the reception of the photomontage from him. In particular, Some of Yamawaki Iwao's photomontage presented as the wall photography in Japan during the Second World War, that was related to the propaganda of Japanese government. It had not been known well in the modern Japanese art and design history because it was related to a declaration of the Second World War by Japan. However, the historical position of his photomontage is very important for Japanese history when we rethink of the reception of the Bauhaus and Moholy-Nagys' photographic theory to build up the Japanese modern history. In the result, this study wants to discuss that the mistake of the term of 'Bauhaus syashin(Bauhaus Photographies)' in Japan is related to the interpretation for the the historical position for Yamawaki Iwao's photomontage in the reception of Bauhaus and Moholy-Nagy's photography in Japan.