This event will be conducted in-person in the Library Atrium and through Zoom. 

For in-person attendance, please register in advance here.
For Zoom attendance, please register here.

Moving away from the focus on capsule architecture that dominates discussion of the Metabolist architects, this talk, based on the book Digesting Metabolism: Artificial Land in Japan 1954–2202, investigates the impact on Japanese housing of Le Corbusier’s idea of “artificial land.” Long buried by the term “megastructure” that it inspired, artificial land joins the individual and collective, envisioning housing as stacked platforms of plots for building freestanding homes of all variety. First introduced to Japan in 1954 by Le Corbusier’s protégé, Takamasa Yosizaka, artificial land is an essential concept for the Metabolists who debuted in Tokyo in 1960. Yet it has had a hold on Japan’s metabolic imagination well beyond the ’60s, promising domestic satisfaction and environmental resilience from the postwar period to today’s government policies. Key built projects from the book will be discussed in terms of artificial land’s diverse interpretations for an infrastructural approach to housing and its control. These projects offer Japanese perspectives on John Habraken’s critical housing question, “who decides when about what?”

The lecture will be followed by a Q&A moderated by Benjamin Aranda.

Casey Mack is an architect and the founding director of Popular Architecture in Brooklyn, New York, an office combining simplicity and innovation in design work across multiple scales. Mack graduated with a B.A. in Art History from Vassar College and an M.Arch from Columbia, afterwards working with OMA in Hong Kong and New York. He has taught urban design and housing at NYIT and Parsons, and currently teaches thesis at Pratt. His work has been published in OASE, Harvard Design Magazine, the New York Review of Architecture, and in the 16th International Docomomo Conference proceedings. Mack's award-winning book, Digesting Metabolism: Artificial Land in Japan 1954-2202 (Hatje Cantz, 2022), has received the support of the Graham Foundation, the New York State Council on the Arts, and the Takenaka Corporation.

This event is free and open to the public. Registration is required.