KOMA
Los Angeles, CA
A Secluded garden forms the meaningful center for KOMA as the new home and gathering place for the Korean American community. Serving as a repository of artifacts and information as well as a stage for diverse activities and events, the center exposes those day to day activities to the life of the street to suggest a vital, living museum.
Ŭm-Yang (Yin-Yang), the principal of contrast and harmony in balance, informs two distinct building diagrams:
A lantern-like garden pavilion, whose transparency mediates between the two diagrams, allows for a play of horizontal wood louvers (Ŭm) with vertical glass panels (Yang).
SITE
Organized as a U-shaped granite structure, KOMA establishes the front of Normandie Avenue, where a small park makes for a widened sidewalk and lobby entrance. To the side, an Olympic Boulevard, entrances to the gift shop and ticket booth form a commercial exposure. To the back, on Mariposa Street, are located vehicular entrances.
PROGRAM
KOMA visitors, from either the street of the lower lever parking, find in the lobby a great bell. As a symbol of KOMA, the bell begins the sequence up the stair to major activity areas. To the north of the lobby lies the Library, a café area opens into a gravel court that introduces visitors to the terraced gardens above.
Arriving at the second floor, on axis with the garden, the visitor finds major activity areas legibly distributed around the U-shaped plan, a configuration traditional to both Korean houses and collective architectures (“three halls – one pagoda,” Koguryŏ). Ahead lies the foyer to both the Performance Hall and the Lecture Hall.
PERFORMANCE HALL / LECTURE HALL
As the “soul” of KOMA, the Performance Hall is at the center of the U-plan and enjoys the flexibility, with sliding panels, of opening to the garden on the west. The Lecture Hall, a place for sharing diverse viewpoints, engages the street with a rear screen projected backdrop. To the south of the stair, glass walls expose the studio activities of the artists in residence for all to see.
PERMANENT COLLECTION GALLERIES
As the “soul” of KOMA, the Performance Hall is at the center of the U-plan and enjoys the flexibility, with sliding panels, of opening to the garden on the west. The Lecture Hall, a place for sharing diverse viewpoints, engages the street with a rear screen projected backdrop. To the south of the stair, glass walls expose the studio activities of the artists in residence for all to see.
TEMPORARY EXHIBITION GALLERIES / GARDEN PAVILLION
The Temporary Exhibitions Galleries occupy a glass frame pavilion, set on a plinth in the garden. Changing patterns of light and shade play through layers of framing with glass panels and wood louvers, filtering views to the west.
THE GARDEN
At the heart of KOMA lies the garden, a place to reflect on nature and its fundamental sacred element: trees, flowers, rocks, and water. Starting at the street level gravel court, the visitor moves up a series of terraces (chang tŏk) to a symbolic mountaintop, a passage from the profane to the sacred. The central garden, a walled inner court (chŏng), becomes, to the north, a hillside park garden (wŏn). The “Four Gentlemen,” plums, bamboo, chrysanthemum, and orchids, occur on the four central terraces. Like the early Tŭl gardens, where the clan would gather to conduct rites for a prosperous harvest, this garden will be a place of unity and prosperity for the Korean American community and their visitors.