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Tower of the Sun
🕑 Added 2023-10-19 13:00:04 +0000 UTCTaro Okamoto, 1970
Many people remember this as the icon of Osaka World Exposition of 1970. Its motto being "People's Progress and Harmony," and only one year after the Appollo 11 landing on the moon, it belonged to the era when all believed in the powers of science and industry, and that every tomorrow will be better than today. Despite that, the Tower was sort actually an antithesis unto itself, as it was suprisingly built backwards, facing away from the cheering crowds on the main Festival Square where it stood. And two of its four faces each represented the Past and the Antiquity, the fourth even cautiously hidden away in a cryptic underground chamber that no visitors would care to see. Were they a counterbalance to Japan's gilded prosperity at the time, which would soon be overtaken by the decades of depression and natural disasters we are still in today?
53 years later, while all of the other futuristic towers and pavilions have been razed and are long gone, the lone Tower of the Sun still stands on the barren grounds of the Exposition Commemorative Park.
...in 2025, Osaka will host yet another World Expo.
(Photo by Aster)
Comments
savaster
原始の太陽(第四の顔)も良いですね:-)
KENSAN
Inside the Tower of the Sun, a monument created by Taro Okamoto in 1970, stands the Tree of Life. It has been closed for a long time for safety reasons, but we have been able to observe it for five years. It is a wonderful space where you can feel the heat and breath of 1970.
