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Yoshizaka, Takamasa
(b Tokyo, 13 Feb 1917; d Tokyo, 17 Dec 1980). Japanese architect, urban planner, teacher and writer. He was the son of a diplomat and spent several years in Europe in his youth. In 1941 he graduated from Waseda University, Tokyo, and began to teach there, continuing until his death. He entered private practice in Tokyo in 1945. From 1950 to 1952 he studied in France and worked in Le Corbusier’s studio in Paris. During this time he translated many of Le Corbusier’s writings including eight volumes of his complete works. He later collaborated on Le Corbusier’s National Museum of Western Art (1957–9), Tokyo, with Kunio Maekawa and Junzo Sakakura, both of whom had also worked for Le Corbusier. Yoshizaka’s first major work, the Japanese Pavilion commissioned by the Japanese Government for the Venice Biennale of 1956, revealed the influence of Le Corbusier in its exposed structural frame and use of concrete. After his time in Le Corbusier’s studio, the expression of regional identity became a central issue for Yoshizaka. He advocated humanism and vernacular approaches to regionalism in architecture, constantly seeking new forms of expression. Examples of his work include the Kaisei High School (1957–8), Nagasaki, the Maison Franco-Japonaise (1960–71), Tokyo, and the Daigaku Seminary Housing (1963–70), Hachioji, Tokyo. These buildings reveal a careful analysis of functional and spatial relationships and a response to context, and they are expressive statements against the monotony of simplistic, rectilinear grid architecture. The Daigaku Seminary Housing, for instance, is a group of individual units stepping down a hill but unified by the main buildings that act as towers or campaniles. This expression of random units held together by a dominant formal element is characteristic of his theory of ‘discontinuous unity’, an important part of his architectural and planning ideas aimed at reconciling the many contradictory elements of society. In 1965 he founded the architectural design group Atelier U; members of the group Team Zoo came from this studio, strongly influenced by Yoshizaka who was one of the pioneers of modern architecture in Japan. He was President of the Architectural Institute of Japan (1973–4) and received many honours and awards during his career.
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