Design: An Elegant Sweep Toward Heaven

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In the late '60s and '70s, Tange's work too often became elephantine and dull: the master plan for Expo '70 in Osaka, palaces for Arab princes, concrete campuses and glossy high-rises in Singapore. It is telling that after architecture's thrusting edge left Tange behind, leaders of developing countries showed a special affinity for his messianic modernism and his eagerness to think big (really big: the campus for King Saud University outside Riyadh will cover 4 sq. mi.). In architecture today, Tange says, "there is not big-scale thinking." Nor is there sufficient "discipline," by which he means adherence to guiding design orthodoxies. He clearly pines for the certainties of the '50s and '60s, when Olympian notions of urban planning were unchallenged. Tange still insists that cities should be forced to expand along straight lines, not allowed to grow in the traditional laissez-faire hodgepodge. He has the hubris to suggest that a city skyline should be made to conform with a pre-determined sculptural pattern. Above all, he believes in order.

He disapproves of the free-for-all stylistic approach of postmodernism: "I think postmodernism is just transitional. I don't believe it will last." So ! he preaches. But his practice, it turns out at this late date, is another matter. His design for a new Tokyo city government complex seems a remarkable departure. True to form, it will be big (3.5 million sq. ft.) and orderly, but the main building is unmodernistic by any reckoning: twin spires with Manhattanish art deco setbacks, a highly sculptural facade of glass and granite intended to evoke Japanese koshi latticework. It is as if John Cage suddenly began composing catchy melodies or Frank Stella turned to painting cute portraits. Is Tange merely accommodating fashion? "You simply cannot have any kind of deadpan glass box," he says, to stand as the new symbol of Tokyo. The explanation is offhanded, and no elaboration is forthcoming. He will not say it, but the new municipal hall is a sort of surrender, on eleventh-hour apostasy. When Kenzo Tange disavows glass boxes, an era has ended.