The Magical House
Exhibition+Sponsored byIn partnership withFree entry

A home is not a hole. 2016.
Didier Fiuza Faustino © ADAGP© Atelier Bow-Wow

The Magical House is a project designed for Maison de la culture du Japon à Paris (The Japan
Cultural Institute in Paris) by the Atelier Bow-Wow (Yoshiharu Tsukamoto, Momoyo Kaijima andYoichi Tamai, Tokyo) and Didier Fiuza Faustino (Bureau des Mésarchitectures, Paris). These architects have long explored the issue of the habitat, inventing innovative and often provocative‘machinery / habitats’.
They have come together to create a ‘magical environment’ for the second component of theTransphere Exhibition cycle.
The Atelier Bow-Wow and Didier Fiuza Faustino are among the most outstanding representatives of this generation of architects of the last decade who have emerged to bring a fresh look to the definitions of architecture
hitherto established. Their research on the living conditions in contemporary cities is artistically subversive andsocially engaged.
For this exhibition, The Magical House, the architects have chosen to work with a common material in a logic ofcyclical production. This material - wood - used in the construction of the two architectures, is sourced in Portugal, where Didier Fiuza Faustino comes from, and will be returned at the end of the show for a second life. Thetwo houses, rebuilt in the middle of a forest, will be accessible to all. Although the architects have decided towork with this same material, the cells they present offer visitors two complementary visions.
For this collaboration, Didier Fiuza Faustino designed a polyhedron with rounded edges. Closed on the outsideby translucent walls, balancing on one of its sides, the hermetically sealed structure is like a refuge, a cell inwhich one might protect oneself from a hostile environment. You could close yourself inside in order to open up
to other areas, to travel elsewhere, even within oneself. This cabin might also be a childhood memory, a space
shuttle in which we imagine traveling through the cosmos.
Alongside this sensitive, intimate installation, the Atelier Bow-Wow has made the generous offer of a roof-shaped
structure the public can enter under to take shelter, or sit upon, making it a place of exchange and conviviality.
Both opaque and transparent, this structure reminds us as much of the slatted facades of traditional Japanese
townhouses, or machiya, as it does of the roofs of the first Shinto shrines.
Visitors are invited to experience both architectures plunged into a darkness inhabited by a shadow play of light,
and of sound and silence, creating a poetic atmosphere inspired by In Praise of Shadows, the masterpiece by
the writer Junichiro Tanizaki, and the concept of the ‘uncanny’ described by Sigmund Freud.
Though the exhibition invites poetic meanderings, it also makes it possible to rethink current urban issues, theproblems of space, but also to question the relationship between individuals and their privacy.
It will be conducive to the organization of workshops and meetings.
Curator : Hou Hanru (Artistic Director of the National Museum of XXI Century Arts - MAXXI, Rome)

Maison de la culture
du Japon à Paris101 bis, quai Branly
75015 Paris
M° Bir-Hakeim
RER Champ de Mars
t: 01 44 37 95 00/01
www.mcjp.fr
facebook: mcjp.officiel
twitter: @MCJP_officiel#MCJP#TRANSPHERE

EXHIBITION
From June 8 to July 30, 2016
Exhibition room (level 2)
Opening hours
Tuesday to Saturday
from 12pm to 8pm
Closed public holiday
Free entry

PRESS CONTACTS
Martial Hobeniche,Noémie Grenier
2e BUREAU
t: +33 (0)1 42 33 93 18
maisonculturejapon@
2e-bureau.com

CONTACTS / MCJP
Exhibition
Mami Iida
t: +33 (0)1 44 37 95 64
m.iida@mcjp.fr
Public relations
Philippe Achermann
t: +33 (0)1 44 37 95 24
p.achermann@mcjp.fr

Around the exhibition
MEETING
Wednesday, June 8 at 6:30 p.m.
with Momoyo Kaijima (Atelier Bow-Wow) and Shooshie Sulaiman
In collaboration with the Kadist Art Foundation(Limited number of seats / reservation www.mcjp.fr)
Contemporary architectural creation is part of a social and cultural debate that questions our relationshipto urban space - public, private - and questions the encounter between art / architecture. These topics andothers will be discussed throughout the evening by Momoyo Kaijima, co-founder of Atelier Bow-Wow, andartist Shooshie Sulaiman whose multifaceted work includes an architectural dimension. It will also be anoccasion to enjoy the structure designed by the Atelier Bow-Wow for MCJP in another manner. Conceived
as an immersive work, open to the public and disposed to meditation, it will provide time for a public meeting space favorable to discussion and reflection.
POETRY EVENING
June 25 at 6 p.m.
(Limited number of seats / reservation www.mcjp.fr)
Plunged in darkness, The Magic House sensitively combines art, architecture and poetry. The MCJP isthus offering an immersion in this dreamlike world with a poetry evening during which Anny Romand willbe the voice of the poet Masayo Koike for Maisons en Poèmes.
WORKSHOPS FOR YOUNGSTERS
22 and 29 June, 6 and 13 July
(Limited number of seats / reservation www.mcjp.fr)
Workshops will be offered to children Wednesday afternoons in the exhibition space.
A good opportunity to discover this intriguing Magic House from a different perspective!