NATIONAL MUSEUM OF WESTERN ART

I didn’t know there was a LeCorbusier building in Tokyo.  Yet there is.  It is called the National Museum of Western Art.   Many sources say that it is one of his least known buildings.  I looked thru some of my architectural history books and it was not included in the major tomes.

It is square in plan.  The upper volume is more or less solid, and it floats above the ground on a grid of thin columns.  The primary vertical circulation is a ramp that is placed at the center of the building.  Sound familiar? Villa Savoye, of course.

Yet just look at the photo below.  The frosted glass panels that you see on the left glow from natural light.  And this light is brought into the building by punching down thru the roof.  So there is a light trough that runs all the way around the building, bringing natural light into the gallery spaces.  Light spills into the building from both sides of the troughs.  And on the other side of those frosted panes is the exterior:  the outside air.  So he really brings the light into the building with minimal buffering.  Again, I didn’t know anything about the building.  So I spent my time in the building just walking around and around the gallery, just looking at how the natural light was working.

In my drawing above, my only goal was to give some sort of depiction of the natural light punching thru the roof.  So the yellow is an idealization of this light from above.  As if the building floats above the ground plane not because of the thin columns, but via it’s physical connection to the light.

Always, always, always, if there is a model of the building in the building, take photos of it.  As these model photos are a godsend when you are trying to understand how the building works.

There have been many additions added to the back of the building.  So as I was doing my research before I drew, I had to dig somewhat to understand what exactly was the original fabric.  And this photo that was in the museum helped to describe what it looked like when it opened.