Gifu Municipal Hall: IAMAS Satellite Campus + Public Gallery

The Institute of Advanced Media Arts and Sciences (IAMAS) is a graduate school established by Gifu Prefecture in 2001. Their goal is to contribute to the progress of academic culture and the promotion of the region. IAMAS combines scientific knowledge with artistic sensibility while striving to educate high-level creators who will plumb the depths of this combination and find inventive ways to improve society. IAMAS is situated in Ogaki city, which, while it is a city, is fairly suburban with a lack of public transport. Instead, the people mostly reply on personal vehicles to travel around the area, compared to Gifu city which has an abundance of public transport, and where walking is a common mode of transport.

My proposal for the reuse of the Gifu Municipal Hall is therefore a satellite campus, maker space and public gallery for IAMAS. This intervention will provide IAMAS with a fresh environment away from their main campus in Ogaki city, giving them new contexts and clients to expand their project scope. Given the wide range of projects and topics that they tackle, the new environment as well as the abundance of potential clients within Gifu city creates many more opportunities, for example the new city hall which was just built opposite the municipal hall. Furthermore, the location is very accessible, and the nearby media cosmos and even the newly built city hall generates more foot traffic, therefore the location invites people to enter and visit the exhibits, generating more visibility for IAMAS’ projects.