Or he might have said: “I can now look more towards the real world.”
Or perhaps: “I now focus more on the real world than the virtual world.”
It’s hard to tell, as each time I replay the tape, the interpreter suggests a different reading of his precise words. Once again, Tokyo has thrown up a moment that unavoidably brings to mind the filmic cliché that is “lost in translation”.
Ito’s office occupies a nondescript four-storey building clad in beige tiles on a side street midway between the chic Aoyama and frenetic Shibuya districts in Tokyo. We are ushered straight from the lift into the fourth-floor meeting room, which has white walls, white furniture and fluorescent strip lights. An assortment of white architectural models and awards – notably the Venice Architecture Biennale’s Golden Lion awarded to Ito in 2002 – are lined up on a shelf. A white porcelain espresso cup, with a tiny green frog instead of a handle, sits on the windowsill.
There’s a whole gang of us here: an interpreter, a local photographer and an interpreter for the photographer. Due to a miscommunication, a second photographer (along with his interpreter) showed up as well, and was sent away with sincere apologies.
Green tea is served and Ito arrives punctually, his serene smile tinged with curiosity and mischief. The previous two times I’ve met him he was wearing red socks with large lime-green spots on them, and T-shirts to match. “I’m sorry, I’m wearing normal black socks today!” says Ito in English, laughing and slurping nosily on his tea. At this point, an exchange in Japanese concludes that the photographer should return the following week, when Ito won’t be wearing a boring white shirt and tie. Ito would not like icon readers to think he was quite this conventional...more
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