Page 48 - Studio International - June 1970

The Japanese Tower of the Sun 4
Sculpture by Michio Ihara in the Monday Plaza
Part of the Festival Plaza, showing the base of the
5
Fountain sculptures by Isamu Noguchi in the
The Daily Plazas
contribution to There are seven smaller Daily Plazas, in each of artificial lake, with the Festival Plaza behind
6
which one or two sculptors show their works in
competition with the riot of architecture Exterior of the Textile Pavilion, designed by
Tadanori Yokoo
Expo 70 2 Foam Wall by Toshio Yoshida in the Mitsui Group
Frozen Perspective by Jiro Takamatsu in the Sunday
Plaza, using a slope of mirrors
Pavilion
3 8
Ear sculpture by Tomio Miki, in the Friday Plaza Dummies by Simon Yotsuya in the corridor of the
Textile Pavilion
The Festival Plaza
As opposed to the symbolic monuments of
previous international exhibitions, the central
feature of Expo 70, the Festival Plaza, is
intended as an 'Invisible Monument' — an
environment responsive to the activities of
those who occupy it. It is equipped with
mobile robots, strobe lights, sophisticated
sound machinery and machines which emit
perfume. The Plaza is the work of Arata
Isozaki, in collaboration with Toshi Ichiya-
nagi, Kunihara Akiyama, Takehisa Kosugi
and others. The Festival Plaza will act as the
setting for a number of performances, from
folk dancing to the EAT display in August.

The Steel Pavilion
One of the most interesting examples the
Expo has to offer of the inter-relationship of
art and technology is the Steel Pavilion,
designed by the architect Kunio Maekawa.
The Pavilion consists of a Space Theatre and
a Foyer. In the latter are musical sculptures
by Francois Baschet. The composer Toru
Takemitsu, who conceived the electronic
systems in the circular Space Theatre, has
declared that it is 'intended to be a context for
new sounds; a new space waiting to be
sounded. In short, it is a musical instrument'.
More than 1500 speakers are installed on
walls, ceiling and floor. The light display in
the theatre was arranged by Keiji Usami, a
29-year-old painter. Blue-green and red laser
beams, sometimes reflected by specially de-
signed mirrors, create intersecting shafts,
screens and 'clouds' of light.

The Textile Pavilion
The most imaginative of all the pavilions, rooms, believes that the human skin is the
designed by Tadanori Yokoo, a Pop graphic beginning of textiles.
designer and illustrator. The pavilion is
painted a sensual red, with scaffolding and The Mitsui Group (Chemical) Pavilion
sculptured workers giving the impression A typical avant-garde pavilion executed largely
that the work is unfinished. Yokoo has stated by contemporary artists. The general director
that he wished to create a 'ruin' in Expo 70, was the light-sculptor Katsuhiro Yamaguchi;
where false flowers of the future are in bloom. inside there is a total theatre with contribu-
Electronic sounds and images projected tions from composers and film-makers. Spec-
on to dismembered figures in relief fill the tators stand on three turntables which move
interior of the dome. The films were directed up and down and around the dome. The
by Toshio Matsumoto and the sounds com- interior surface acts as a screen for simul-
posed by Joji Yuasa. In the corridor sur- taneous projections.
rounding the central space is a line of tall
dummies in formal clothes, designed by Home, my Home ese. The structure's contents include a
Simon Yotsuya. Elsewhere in the pavilion This is a small collective work in a corner of a combination car and bed, an aluminium-
are two identical rooms, inhabited by human garden of the Expo Museum, in construction covered TV set, and a two-metre pile of gold-
statues, one entirely white, the other covered a miniature version of the museum itself. plastered excrement, shaped at the top to
entirely in multi-coloured patterned textiles. Seven young artists have collaborated to resemble the head of the Tower of the
Sun.
Masunobu Yoshimura, who designed these represent the typical home life of the Japan-