to find their bearings in a building whose sheer size and labyrinthine galleries and hallways can be disorienting. "The streamlined lobby has entrances at both ends, while the central atrium — or 'light garden,' as Taniguchi prefers — provides glimpses of upper floors," she writes. "Off to one side, the garden and a stairway are immediately apparent. On upper floors, bridges connect old and new parts of the building. Glass barriers around the atrium provide dramatic views within the museum. ... 'I wanted to direct people visually, not with signs,' says Taniguchi, who cuts openings in walls to show their thickness and to expose what lies behind them. 'In big European museums it is easy to get lost,' he says. 'You get tired visually and physically. In this museum, I intentionally created places where people can locate themselves. This is a modern way of thinking — expressing function, not hiding.'" Taniguchi designed the Texas Asia Society Center in Houston. This $40 million project is located in the Houston Museum District and is Taniguchi's first freestanding new building in the United States. Awards 2005 : Praemium Imperiale 2021: Person of Cultural Merit Gallery of works Further reading Dana Buntrock. "Yoshio Taniguchi: master of minimalism." Architecture, October 1996. References External links Museum of Modern Art biography 1937 births Harvard Graduate School of Design alumni Keio University alumni Japanese architects Modernist architects Living people Persons of Cultural Merit Recipients of the Praemium Imperiale Recipients of the Order of the Rising Sun, 3rd class