Tadao ando biography summary worksheets

Tadao Ando, one of the most important contemporary Japanese architects, has pursued what he calls an architecture that moves people with its poetic and creative power. His numerous buildings yield intensely meaningful and didactic experiences. In so doing, Ando has engaged the discipline in the core philosophical questions on humanistic values, such as the end and purpose of creativity, or what architecture can contribute to improve the quality of human existence. To study his architecture is to examine how architecture can conceivably enhance the world as a humanistic discipline.

On the tangible level, Ando’s works may be characterized by their primary walls, constructed out of limited materials and composed of purely geometric forms. Raw, unfinished reinforced concrete has been Ando’s material of choice since his earliest years; later he added a shorter list of wooden buildings. These rather reductive methods, however, should never be taken to demonstrate a lack of intention, nor do they result in poor spatial qualities; instead, they are the consequence of Ando’s willful determination to stage, though intangible they may be, rich architectural experiences. Ando’s simple materials and forms engage a viewer in an appreciation of arch