Isamu Noguchi

Trip Start May 28, 2009
Trip End Jun 21, 2009

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Flag of Japan  , Hokkaido,
Wednesday, June 10, 2009

My friend took me to the Moerenuma Park ( where a famous Japanese-American architect/designer, Isamu Noguchi designed.
He's famous for those Akari series lights (you can see these at IKEA often).

I heard this place was just for garbage dumping... and the city of Sapporo decided to have a nice park here.

We had a nice lunch at "Yuuhi no mieru (you can see sunset)" restaurant.

This park also has this crazy fountain... the water goes up as high as 25 meters.

I could learn a bit about Isamu Noguchi today.
His father was a Japanese guy, and his mother was an American teacher.
Once his father knew his mother was pregnant, he went back to Japan.
Isamu was raised by his mother mostly in Japan, and he went to the US to study.

During the war, Isamu was set to a concentration camp.
After the war, he submitted his design for the Hiroshima Dome Museum, but his work was denied because he was "American".
One side he was accused to be Japanese, and the other side he was denied because he was American. I can only imagine how he was thinking of his own identity.
However, he designed the bridges near the monument in Hiroshima.
Then, this just reminded me of the Issey Miyake's article on the New York Times.

I've never been to Hiroshima yet.
It's not to blame someone now. It's a history, but there are many histories that shouldn't be forgotten... not only these nuclear bombs in Hiroshima and Nagasaki, but also how the Japanese did in Asia and Pacific during the war. We should keep remembering how cruel those were, but again, not to blame, but not to forget for our future.
There are still many wars and violence going on in the world. Japan and Japanese people really should take this role to send the message out to the world, "war is not the answer, violence wouldn't solve anything in a long run".
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