The House Vision 2016
House Vision is an exhibition/forum initiated in 2013 by Japanese leading graphic designer Kenya Hara, who is also known for his influential advisory role for a Japanese brand MUJI. He conceived the House Vision as a platform to propose new opportunities to pursue happiness through the act of living. He believes that the Japanese urban environment can be a juncture where highly advanced technology (future) meets social infrastructure (modern), and people’s knowledge/wisdom or value system accumulated over the past thousands of years (tradition and heritages), to start designing new standards of living that re-imagine the essential elements of life and happiness.
At the House Vision, designers and architects, product/service providers (industries) meet their recipients (residents – consumers – members of community/society) to brew synergy to help shape our future.
Kenya Hara, the director of the House Vision talks about its concept. (English subtitle available)
The House Vision 2016 is the second exhibit directed by Hara. The exhibit site was designed by the leading Japanese architect Kengo Kuma.
Kenya Hara, Exhibition Director
Kengo Kuma, Exhibition Design
Photo by Yoshiaki Tsutsui
Designer, Kenya Hara (b. 1958) emphasizes the design of both on objects and experiences. In 2002, he became a member of MUJI’s advisory board and began acting as its art director.
President, the Nippon Design Center, Inc.
Professor at Musashino Art Universtiy
President, Japan Design Committee Co., Ltd.
Vice President, Japan Graphic Designers Association Inc.
Kengo Kuma (b. 1954) is an architect and professor at the Graduate School of Architecture at the University of Tokyo. He established Kengo Kuma & Associates in 1990 in Japan, and Kengo Kuma & Associates Europe in Paris, France in 2008.
Featured architects
The theme of the 2nd House Vision was “Co-divisual,” meaning staying connected when separated, and getting together when being far-apart.
It aimed to offer a completely new vision to re-integrate today’s society, which faces two unprecedented and conflicting phenomena: 1) extraordinary material/informational abundance and enjoyment enabled by technology, and 2) isolation, division and excessive individualism that plagues people’s lives. Surrounding those issues are even larger risks we face today such as climate change, demographic change (rapid population growth in certain areas, while population decreases and ages in other areas), and change in resource supply (shortage of energy, food, water etc).
