Day 2 in Tokyo was action-packed. We started off the morning by heading to Roppongi which is a district known for shopping and commercial activity kind of like midtown Manhattan. There's a huge skyscraper called the Mori Tower that we went to the observation deck of and that also contains an art museum. That's the view (above) from the deck of the Mori Tower looking at Tokyo Tower (the red and white Eiffel Tower looking thing... it was a little foggy). We saw a fabulous contemporary art exhibit there on another floor, and one of the artists was featured at Prospect.1 in New Orleans in January 2009 with the same installation. Go NOLA for being ahead of the curve. Below is a picture of this great sound installation piece.
We then went to Tokyo Midtown, a huge skyscraper mall/tower complex that is loosely based on the Rockefeller Center complex idea of mixing business/retail/public space. And this was no ordinary mall... We're talking Chloe, Marni, Harry Winston, etc. Super high-end. Who knew Muji sold clothes?! Also a beautiful building. There's a Tadao Ando museum at Tokyo Midtown that we visited, but more importantly, we shopped (I kid). This is the Ando 21_21 Design Sight building:
We followed that up with a visit to the National Art Center by Kurokawa. It has this great undulating glass facade with horizontal louvers.
And then we headed to this wacky mid-century Modern theater called the Nissay Theater to see the interior. It's supposed to look like it's under the sea, so the theater ceiling is covered in shells. The entire lobby is white and hot pink. These shots are the theater interior:
The day was capped off by attending Pecha Kucha night in Tokyo, its place of origin, where we watched not only our professor present, but some awesome artists/entrepreneurs give little lectures. Imagine my surprise when a UVa professor presented, too (John Quale).
It was an awesome day.
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