Designing Japan

A Future Built on Aesthetics

Hara Kenya

"Designing Japan" presents renowned designer Kenya Hara's vision of how his industry can support Japan in crafting a future founded on a unique philosophy of beauty as well as crowd-sourced wisdom from around the world. A master collaborator, meticulous organiser, and globally conscious innovator, Hara draws on more than three decades of participations in design work and exhibition curating, as well as deep professional interaction with creators from many fields.

In "Designing Japan" Hara reveals methods that make publicly accessible aesthetic inquiries of how this island nation will proceed as its population ages, other nations take over manufacturing, and technology develops. Illustrations and examples recognise successful problem-solving through design, proving that it is a living, changing industry that remains relevant not in spite of, but as a partner to, advancing technology.

About the Author

Born in 1958. Graphic designer Kenya Hara served as the director of the Tokyo Fiber exhibition. He specializes in designing not objects but facts or events, such as identifications and communications. He produced the exhibition "RE-DESIGN_Daily Products of the 21st Century" in 2000, and through it he showed that the most marvelous sources of design were to be found in the context of daily life. In 2002, he became a member of the advisory board of MUJI and also took over as art director. In 2004, he produced the exhibition "HAPTIC_Awakening the Senses". With this exhibition he demonstrated that within the contemporary context of design, in which designers tend to find their motivations spurred on by high technology, in fact vast resources for creation lay dormant in the human senses. He has directed work related to national events, such as the programs for the opening and closing ceremonies of the Nagano Olympics, and the official posters of the Aichi Expo 2005. Based in Tokyo, he has been seeking future communication resources he finds within Japanese culture and technology. His book "Designing Design" has been translated into several Asian languages, and in 2007 he largely rewrote it for translation into English, for publication by Lars Muller Publishers, Switzerland. At present he is the representative of Nippon Design Center Inc. and Professor of Musashino Art University.

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