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Annual Architecture Lecture

Kengo Kuma: Nature and Architecture

14 Jul 2008
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Kengo Kuma portrait
Kengo Kuma portrait © dbox

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Kengo Kuma: 'I want to create weak buildings. I think I have always wanted to create weak buildings. Many people believe buildings ought to be strong because buildings are expected to safeguard the frail bodies of human beings. The reason buildings must be strong is to function as a shelter. Buildings must not only offer physical protection but also suggest sturdiness in order to inspire a feeling of security. (Monumentality is another word for that sort of sturdiness.) Humans' mentality has long been this way hence we constructed strong, sturdy buildings accordingly.'

Kengo Kuma, Orbe Tea Room
Kengo Kuma, Orbe Tea Room Photo: Daici Ano

John Robertson Architects The Annual Architecture Lecture is proudly supported by John Robertson Architects and the Japanese Committee of Honour of the Royal Academy of Arts.

Summer Exhibition gallery, RA; 6.45–8pm, doors open 6.30pm

Academy Shop

Show photo credits

Joan Miró, The Birth of Day 1 (Naissance du jour 1), 1964. Oil on canvas, 146 x 113.5 cm. Fondation Marguerite et Aimé Maeght, Saint-Paul. Photo © Galerie Maeght.
© Succession Miró/ADAGP, Paris and DACS, London 2008.

 

The Antioch Chalice, Byzantine, from Syria, possibly Kaper Koraon or Antioch, first half of the sixth century. Silver cup set in footed silver-gilt shell, Height 19. 7 cm. Lent by the Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York. The Cloisters Collection, 1950 (50.4). Photo © The Metropolitan Museum of Art