In conversation with Vikas Bhadra, young Japanese Designer Nakamura Kazunobu says he loves using points, lines and surfaces to fulfil the Japanese sense of beauty in space, as discussed by Junichiro Tanizaki in his ‘In Praise of Shadows’ an essay on Japanese aesthetics
When I was a child, I wanted to be a sculptor. I liked drawing, but I liked making three-dimensional objects even more says Japanese Designer Nakamura Kazunobu, the self-taught designer, initially one his works “Salome” won a DFA Design for Asia Awards 2015 in Hong Kong under the merit category. This year Nakamura was also awarded the People’s Choice Award at the Frame Awards 2020 ceremony held in Amsterdam.
Looking back at his journey so far Nakamura says “At the beginning of my journey, I didn’t have much of an opportunity to work with famous designers. I never trained under a famous designer. So, to my shame, I’ve taught myself to design. I liked the dynamic composition and dynamic curves of the paintings by the Japanese painter Eitoku Kano, Tohaku Hasegawa and Katsushika Hokusai. When I was young, I wanted to copy their paintings and get to know their essence. Nowadays, I design my work with the idea that I want to enter the space of the great waves depicted in their paintings and stand in a place where I am wrapped up in their flow.”
“Having said that,” he continues “I believe good design is a work that has an astonishing freshness to it, and an atmosphere and image that we have never seen before. I don’t think a design that has a vibe or image I’ve seen somewhere, even if it looks sophisticated, is true good design in my opinion. I think the work by good design can be a great image maker of era. I’m continuing to work hard, dreaming that one day I will be able to create work of that level.”
Though Nakamura is ideally an interior designer who specializes in everything from installation design to public space design, his idea of design differs from the way an architect tends to define it. However he continues to remain immensely inspired by their work “I have a lot of respect for Frank Lloyd Wright, Mies, Rem Koolhaas and Kazuyo Sejima. If I had to name just one person, my design idol would be Ryue Nishizawa. He is an architect in partnership with Kazuyo Sejima. Their work always moves me when I see it. The archetypes of straight lines, curves, bumps, and manipulated shapes are a set of shapes that anyone can think of, but the space they manipulate and the space created by these elements coming together reveals a figure that no one has ever seen before. I like the works designed by Ryue Nishizawa, the Teshima Art Museum and the Hiroshi Senju Museum Karuizawa, both of which were designed independently by Nishizawa. I think they are good designs that have realized a surprising space.”
Kazunobu believes that unlike an architect a spatial designer’s creation cannot be realized only on the basis of function alone “Architecture is often explained by function. But I believe that what is required in the design of a space cannot be explained by function alone. The design of the space is more like art. I think spatial design is about using space to express something that appeals to people’s emotions. After realizing the functions required of the space, I think space design is about designing the space with the intention of creating some kind of presence, some kind of atmosphere, and some kind of ineffable beauty.”
Furthermore, unlike an architect who can bank on a client brief, a spatial designer has to think along a different tangent “When I work on a new project, I keep in mind the client’s ambiguous image, the potential of the site, and the motifs that normally interest me in my design studies. I feel that there is a design answer that makes them feel like they resonate with each other. I feel that there will always be a design answer where those images overlap and feel like they resonate. I always look for that one point of resonance and repeat the design study.”
The Japanese are well-known for minimalist designs, many architecture and design projects which come up across the world seems to proliferate the same idea. It makes one ponder, is the essence of culture in design getting saturated, is the world heading towards some kind of uniformity in design “I feel that space design and interior design are like clothes,” says Nakamura “there is fashion in clothes, and each person chooses clothes to express their identity and express themselves. I think that interior design should also have individuality in each place. Even if the design languages are casually similar, I don’t think they should be unified. Of course, culture influences our tastes and values, and I think there are times when our designs are unconsciously similar to each other. Even so, I think that designing each place with individuality will lead to enriching the entire cityscape.”
Likewise, evolution in design is also constant, though unconscious similarities do tend to play out, the progression of design continues “Unlike in the West, Japanese spatial design was originally two-dimensional and flat. The expression of three-dimensional effect and recognition in space were recognized by the parallel layered overlap of flat panels. I think this is a different view of the world from that of the Western perspective of a continuously connected world, which creates a three-dimensional representation of space. I think it continued in the Japanese designer’s unconscious thought process until before modern era. In modern times, Japanese space design has gradually become able to come up with ideas by incorporating a Western three-dimensional effect. Furthermore, in recent years, digital technology and programming technology have been introduced, and I feel that it has become possible to realize a three-dimensional hybrid design with a flat feeling that Japan likes.”
For a spatial designer whose work is receiving global attention, Nakamura was not quite sure it would work out that way. I wandered around looking for a job and eventually found my way to a job as a spatial designer. I was bound by customs and common sense when designing. I always wrote down my fantasy designs in a sketchbook, but I thought it was something that couldn’t be realized, something that was insignificant. This was until ‘Salome’ happened.
In his spatial designs Nakamura uses the foreplay of lights and shadows “I love to create a place where one can feel the presence of the air filled with haze and fog through an artwork that seems to dance in the air. The artwork will be as beautiful a shape as the flow of water and air. I try to design such artworks that create such a space using points, lines and surfaces. Much of this has to do with the Japanese sense of beauty in space, as discussed by Junichiro Tanizaki in his ‘In Praise of Shadows’. Nakamura likes to take a cue from the essay on Japanese aesthetics where Tanizaki implies ‘I am not designing for the purpose of manipulating the shape itself, but for the effect that the shape will have by manipulating itself.’ As the year 2020 comes to an end and the new year beacons Nakamura is keen do an installation in Shibuya, one of the special city wards based in Tokyo, Japan.
Photo Credit: Atsushi Ishida and Nakamura Kazunobu Design-Works
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