Projects / Culture     

Ode to Osaka

In 1970, Sverre Fehn designed an inflatable, breathing pavilion for the competition for the Nordic pavilion at the Osaka Expo. Manthey Kula realised the idea in a new installation.

Architect: Sverre Fehn 1970, Manthey Kula AS 2015
Published 03 Sep, 2015
 
Ode to Osaka. Reinterpretation of Sverre Fehn’s project from 1970 by Manthey Kula. The new installation has a steel bench where you can sit and feel the space “breathe”.

Ode to Osaka. Reinterpretation of Sverre Fehn’s project from 1970 by Manthey Kula. The new installation has a steel bench where you can sit and feel the space “breathe”.

Manthey Kula’s installation is not a full-scale realisation of Fehn’s proposal, but can be experienced as a space.

View from the airlock into the interior.

The Osaka installation is inflated inside the Fehn-pavilion at the architecture museum in Oslo.

Fehn’s original sketch. The Osaka pavilion was conceived as a breathing, moving lung filled with clean air, a comment to the 1970’s focus on polllution.
Copyright: National Museum of Art, Architecture and Design.

From Fehn’s model shots for the 1970 competition proposal, which was bigger, and was to have images projected on the inflated surface.
Copyright: National Museum of Art, Architecture and Design.

From Fehn’s model shots for the 1970 competition proposal.
Copyright: National Museum of Art, Architecture and Design.

Section through the Fehn pavilion with the installation Ode to Osaka.

Plan of the museum with Ode to Osaka in the Fehn pavilion.

Completion: 2015

Address:
Tollbugata 23, Porsgrunn

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Photo:
Rasmus Hjortshøj, Adam Mørk

Architect Sverre Fehn’s competition entry for the Scandinavian pavilion at the World Fair in Osaka 1970 is now in the collection of the Norwegian National Museum – Architecture. As part of a strategy for activating its collection, the museum commissioned architects Manthey Kula to develop a concept for some kind of realization of Sverre Fehn’s competition entry.
The installation now on show is a contemporary installation based on and honoring Fehn’s idea of a breathing space. The structure consists of a timber airlock and an inflated, moving textile structure.

Facts:
_Ode to Osaka_ was on show at the National Museum – Architecture from 5th June to 13th September 2015. See [Ode to Osaka](http://www.nasjonalmuseet.no/no/utstillinger_og_aktiviteter/utstillinger/nasjonalmuseet__arkitektur/Ode+til+Osaka.b7C_wlfQ0_.ips "Ode to Osaka").