The First Farewell: The Mizumidō

All buildings talk, but only a few make any sense. 
And even fewer are capable of poetry. 

One of the purposes of architecture is communication, whether it's an idea or an entire philosophy. But it is only one of many purposes and usually not the most important one, so it's understandable that most buildings are never designed to truly communicate. 

But religious structures are a little different. They exist mainly so they can communicate. All else is secondary. And that is why you can actually have conversations with them. Long, profound conversations.

That is if you know how to, of course. 
Architecture is experienced, not seen. It is similar to painting or literature in that sense, but dramatically different in that architecture has access to multiple dimensions to communicate with you (you can't actually walk through a painting, but you can through a building, which opens up many avenues, no pun intended). 

It takes a certain openness, a vulnerability, that allows us to communicate with the world, because with communication comes feeling. It is no different with architecture (or any art, for that matter). One needs to be able to stand with their heart completely open, open to anything that can come in. Unfortunately, it is a skill adulthood kills in most of us, so it is something to be re-acquired.

Anyway, back to architecture. 
It is possible that every time one visits a masterwork of architecture anywhere in the world, one can drink from the deep waters of history. Drink straight, unfiltered, from the traditions, philosophy and context that gave birth to that singular structure which wouldn't exist anywhere else in the world. No purer source to experience time, really.


***


Waters, yes, waters.
Is there any modern master who understands water's relationship to architecture more intensely than Tadao Ando? No wonder I have a particularly intimate relationship with his work, because somehow water, sky and austerity seem to occupy critical positions in both our worldviews.

And so it brings us to the Mizumidō, the Water Temple at the Honpukuji. It is a temple in the Shingon Buddhist tradition, a twelve hundred year old tradition with its own multi-layered architecture, rituals and belief system that existed and thrived long before Ando, a modern architect, was tasked with interpreting that in the 1980s. And this is what he came up with.

Tucked away in a tiny village in Awaji, far away from the Shinkansen trail and consequently the tourist trail, it has a bucolic existence of its own. No one really goes there. Silence abounds, perfect for a proper conversation.

And I had one this morning.
Of course I'm not translating any of that for you, reader, because it is untranslatable. I can share some pictures, which are also pitiful attempts at capturing its light, but they're all I have. (You can easily find better pictures on the web, done with the right equipment and permissions.)

Reinterpretations of ancient traditions in modern materials is a magnificent avenue to feel so many things (modernist cathedrals, for example). I'm obsessed with such structures, enough to travel across the world just for moments with them. In the right hands, the chance to reinterpret tradition for the future can be a powerful force, a way of bending time.

How do I describe this structure?
An unassuming approach, a return to essentials in terms of materials, an inversion of tradition by descending into a temple as opposed to ascending. Lotus. Shakkei, borrowed from the ancients but done anew. And water, glorious water, as a tool to expand the world.

Trying to describe architecture in words is akin to describing music in words, which is to say futile. All I can say is that it was sublime. I don't use that word lightly, but it is what it is. 

I only live and travel so I can feel emotions preserved in time and this genius, somehow, gave me access to an entire millennium worth of them. Ironically, even the word religious feels inadequate to describe it.