Collections of the Present in the 20th Century and Beyond: Tokyo’s Fieldwork and Guidebooks as Curatorial Practices

Anastasia Gkoliomyti; Yoshiharu Tsukamoto

doi:10.6092/issn.2612-0496/10226

Authors

Anastasia Gkoliomyti Yoshiharu Tsukamoto Laboratory, Tokyo Institute of Technology https://orcid.org/0000-0003-0033-7298

Anastasia Gkoliomyti (b.1992) received her M.Arch from National Technical University of Athens in 2018. After receiving a scholarship from Japan’s Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology to pursue studies in Japan, she now does research as part of Tsukamoto Laboratory at Tokyo Institute of Technology. Her interests include cross-cultural studies of space, geography and anthropology of spatial practices, themes which were explored in her thesis: “Geography of Thought: The Japanese Tearoom” (NTUA, 2017)
Yoshiharu Tsukamoto Tokyo Institute of Technology

Yoshiharu Tsukamoto (b.1965) is Professor of Architecture at Department of Architecture and Building Engineering, Tokyo Institute of Technology. Together with Momoyo Kaijima they established the architectural firm Atelier Bow-Wow in 1992. Yoshiharu Tsukamoto is head of Tsukamoto Laboratory, with interests of integrating existing design theories with the concept of behaviorology. He has also been visiting professor at Harvard University, University of California, Los Angeles, Cornell University, Rice University, Columbia University, Delft University of Technology, and the Royal Danish Academy of Fine Arts.

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.6092/issn.2612-0496/10226

Keywords:

curation, tokyo, fieldwork, urban, guidebook

Abstract

Cities worldwide are transforming at an unprecedented speed. The technological advances of the 20th century have instilled significant transformations for urban centers around the world. In this context, the preservation of local communities is becoming a growing challenge for authorities worldwide. In times of such shifts for cities, the relationship between urban past, present, and future becomes a place of negotiation for academics and practitioners alike, with curatorial practices being at its center, creating a shift towards documentations of everyday ordinary life. Tokyo in particular, poses an exemplary case of urban transformations due to social, cultural, and economic restructuring that followed the opening of Japan’s borders in 1868. As a result, fieldwork that took place in the 20th century and beyond evolved to be a vigorous practice that took different forms, aiming to “collect the present”. These works can be retrospectively connected to discuss on notions of curation and interpretation of the city’s transformation, and the role of the observer.

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Collections of the Present in the 20th Century and Beyond: Tokyo’s Fieldwork and Guidebooks as Curatorial Practices

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