Daily Archives: March 6, 2024

Riken Yamamoto, 2024 Laureate of the Pritzker Architecture Prize

Watch these videos to learn more about Riken Yamamoto

https://www.pritzkerprize.com/laureates/riken-yamamoto#laureate-page-2626

Japanese architect Riken Yamamoto (b. 1945) was born in Beijing, People’s Republic of China and relocated to Yokohama, Japan shortly after the end of World War II. Negotiating a balance between public and private dimensions from childhood, he lived in a home that was modeled after a traditional Japanese machiya, with his mother’s pharmacy in the front and their living area in the rear. “The threshold on one side was for family, and on the other side for community. I sat in between.”

Yamamoto knew little about his father, who had passed away when the architect was only five years old. In some ways, he sought to emulate his father’s career as an engineer, but instead forged his own path into architecture. At age 17, he visited Kôfuku-ji Temple, in Nara, Japan, originally built in 730 and finally reconstructed in 1426, and was captivated by the Five-storied Pagoda symbolizing the five Buddhist elements of earth, water, fire, air and space. “It was very dark, but I could see the wooden tower illuminated by the light of the moon and what I found at that moment was my first experience with architecture.”