Transnational networkers-Iwao and Michiko Yamawaki and the formation of Japanese Modernist design

The network of Japanese designers who trained abroad in the inter-war period significantly shaped the phenomenon of Japanese Modernism-a phenomenon still to be thoroughly explored in the context of Modernism studies. This article offers a new perspective focusing on the mutual nature of transnational exchanges rather than the mono local context or the one way 'influence' of the Bauhaus and Constructivism on Japan which has been studied in the past. My analysis of the Bauhaus network as a component of the larger network of 1930s Japanese modernity in architecture and design confirms that one cannot capture this transnational landscape properly unless one considers the hybrid and productive outcomes shared by a network of artists involved. The analysis presents a number of networks that interact and overlap, with particular attention to the network of women artists.