A lecture by architectural historian Helena Čapková will explore the extraordinary lives and work of Czech-Jewish American architect Antonín Raymond and French-American designer Noémi Raymond, whose work profoundly influenced the shape of modern architecture across continents. Through their projects in Japan, India, and the United States, the lecture will explore modernism as a dynamic process of intercultural exchange and present the Raymonds as key figures in 20th-century global architecture.
Born in Europe and trained in the United States, the Raymonds established their practice in Japan in the 1920s, where they developed a distinctive architectural language that combined reinforced concrete modernism with Japanese craftsmanship, spatial discipline, and sensitivity to climate. Working in Tokyo in the orbit of Frank Lloyd Wright during the construction of the Imperial Hotel, the Raymonds soon moved beyond Wright’s influence to forge their own path. Over the next decades, they designed houses, churches, schools, and institutional buildings that bridged Europe, America, and Asia. Their work demonstrates that modernism was never a purely Western export, but a dynamic process of exchange and adaptation.
The lecture will also highlight Noémi Raymond’s often under-recognized role as designer, collaborator, and intellectual partner. Together, the Raymonds reveal a story of migration, collaboration, and cross-cultural dialogue that challenges conventional narratives of modern architecture. Through selected projects in Japan, India, and the United States, this talk repositions the Raymonds as key protagonists in a truly global modernism.
Helena Čapková is a Tokyo/ Kyoto/Prague based curator, researcher, and art/ architecture history professor at Ritsumeikan University, Kyoto. Since 2010, she has published and lectured extensively about Japanese modernism and avant garde that she considers as an inherent part of art history, traditionally perceived as Western. Her publications on this topic include: Transnational networkers – Iwao and Michiko Yamawaki and the formation of Japanese Modernist Design (2014), Believe in socialism … - architect Bedřich Feuerstein and his perspective on modern Japan and architecture (2016); English-Japanese publication – Antonin Raymond in Japan, 1948-1976, recollections of friends (2022) and Bedřich Feuerstein, architect. Prague-Paris-Tokyo (2022).
Free entry
