Hitoshi Abe on place-making and layered formalism at UCLA

2013-11-05T17:11:00-05:00

How can we understand a place, and seek to define it? What elements do we identify as components of that place, and how do they interact with each other? In a recent lecture at the University of California, Los Angeles, Hitoshi Abe, chair of UCLA’s Architecture and Urban Design department, approached these questions through a study of Atelier Hitoshi Abe, his design practice located in both Los Angeles and Sendai, Japan. Drawing on Japanese ideas of place-making, Abe conceptualizes his structures not as monoliths of positive and negative spaces, but as a system of layers that collectively define the building.

The concepts of “space” and “place”, as conceived by Japanese philosopher Kitaro Nishida, are part of the objective reality that an individual uses to define themselves -- but instead of that objective reality being based on discrete physical forms, the sense of self arises from a reactive relationship with the space, rather than in opposition to it*. Highlighting internati...

Hitoshi Abe to lecture at UCLA, November 1

2013-10-28T20:16:00-04:00

Hitoshi Abe, the Chair of Architecture and Urban Design at UCLA and principal at Atelier Hitoshi Abe Sendai/Los Angeles, will lecture on the UCLA campus this Friday, November 1.

Atelier Hitoshi Abe is known for producing both structurally inventive and and spatially complex architecture, with offices in both Sendai, Japan and Los Angeles. Since winning first prize in the Miyagi Stadium competition in 1992, Dr. Hitoshi Abe has maintained an international practice alongside lecturing and publishing. He became Chair of Architecture and Urban Design at UCLA in 2007.

As A.UD Chair, Abe has developed programming to be more cross-cultural, technologically innovative, and critical, while also establishing the new M.Arch II program, SUPRASTUDIO.

Event details:

Where: Perloff Hall, Decafe, UCLA Campus

When: 6:30pm, Friday, November 1

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Hitoshi Abe on place-making and layered formalism at UCLA

Hitoshi Abe to lecture at UCLA, November 1