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Otaka, Masato
(b Fukushima Prefect., 8 Sept 1923). Japanese architect. He graduated in architecture from the University of Tokyo in 1947 and worked in the office of Kunio Maekawa from 1949 to 1961 when he left to open his own office in Tokyo. Otaka was a founder-member of the Metabolist group in 1960, together with Takashi Asada (1921–1990), Kiyoshi Awazu, Noboru Kawazoe (b 1926), Kiyonori Kikutake, Kisho Kurokawa and Fumihiko Maki. He and Maki published a study of ‘group’ or ‘collective’ forms, suggesting that the individual elements within an architectural ensemble could be organized according to rules that were freer than traditional principles of composition. Otaka explored these ideas in a series of urban projects such as a mixed-use development (1962) in Sakaide featuring an ‘urban platform’ or deck raised off the ground; several buildings for Japanese agricultural cooperatives; the Tochigi Prefectural Conference Hall (1969), Utsunomiya, a heavily formal structure that incorporates abstract elements of traditional post-and-beam construction in precast concrete; the Motomachi and Chojuen high-rise flats (1973), Hiroshima, a large-scale development that follows the curve of the river in a zigzag form; and the Cultural Centre (1984), Fukushima, a much lighter group of buildings that echo the pavilion form and steeply pitched roofs of traditional Japanese architecture.
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