Tadao Ando at Naoshima: Art, Architecture, Nature showcases the latest work in an on-going process of building by Tadao Ando at the acclaimed Naoshima Island Art Complex. Featured here is Ando's recently completed Chichu Art Museum, an underground facility built on the small island in the Inland Sea of Japan. With respect for the landscape and the traditional use of the land as terraced salt fields, Ando was here determined to utterly adapt architecture to the topography, burying much of the complex volume below the ground. He was moved to fully explore the potential of "underground architecture," which imposes its own order and sensibility on space, allowing in only limited light while increasing a sense of depth, fostering ultimately cool tranquility in which one becomes enfolded. On permanent exhibit in the museum, and shown here, is an important body of work by impressionist Claude Monet as well as other major works by contemporary artists Walter De Maria and James Turrell.
Tadao Ando is the most revered Japanese architect at work today. Beloved and admired for his powerful, meditative spaces and his sensual and yet refined use of the materials of the modern trade-wood, steel, concrete, glass-Ando's work resonates with profound intelligence, unpretentious elegance, and an almost palpable sense of harmony. Tadao Ando at Naoshima: Art, Architecture, Nature showcases the latest work in an on going process of building by Tadao Ando at the acclaimed Naoshima Island Art Complex. Featured here is Ando's recently completed Chichu Art Museum, an underground facility built on the small island in the Inland Sea of Japan. With respect for the landscape and the traditional use of the land as terraced salt fields, Ando adapted the architecture to the topography, by burying much of the complex volume below the ground. Ando's Naoshima is a stunning demonstration of architectural virtuosity.
