Madeline Helen Arakawa Gins (November 7, 1941 – January 8, 2014) was an American artist, architect, and poet.

Early life and education

Gins was born in

New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...

, November 7, 1941, and raised on Long Island, in the village of Island Park. She studied

physics Physics is the natural science that studies matter, its fundamental constituents, its motion and behavior through space and time, and the related entities of energy and force. "Physical science is that department of knowledge which r ...

and

Eastern philosophy Eastern philosophy or Asian philosophy includes the various philosophies that originated in East and South Asia, including Chinese philosophy, Japanese philosophy, Korean philosophy, and Vietnamese philosophy; which are dominant in East Asia, ...

Barnard College Barnard College of Columbia University is a private women's liberal arts college in the borough of Manhattan in New York City. It was founded in 1889 by a group of women led by young student activist Annie Nathan Meyer, who petitioned Columbia ...

Career

Gins met her partner and husband, artist

Shusaku Arakawa was a Japanese conceptual artist and architect. He had a personal and artistic partnership with the writer and artist Madeline Gins that spanned more than four decades in which they collaborated on a diverse range of visual mediums, including: ...

, in 1963, while studying painting at the Brooklyn Museum Art School. One of their earlier collaborations, "The Mechanism of Meaning", was shown in its entirety at the 1997 Guggenheim exhibition, ''Arakawa/Gins – Reversible Destiny/We Have Decided Not to Die''. In 1987, as a means of financing the design and construction of works of architecture (that draw on The Mechanism of Meaning), Arakawa and Gins founded the Reversible Destiny Foundation. The Foundation actively collaborates with practitioners in a wide range of disciplines including, experimental biology, neuroscience, quantum physics, experimental phenomenology, and medicine. Their architectural projects included residences (Bioscleave House (Lifespan Extending Villa), Reversible Destiny Lofts (In memory of Helen Keller) – Mitaka, Tokyo, Japan), parks (Site of Reversible Destiny-Yoro) and plans for housing complexes and neighborhoods (Reversible Destiny Fun House, BOOM-LGBT Community, Isle of Reversible Destiny-Venice and Isle of Reversible Destiny-Fukuoka, Sensorium City, Tokyo). She and Arakawa "lost their life savings" to the Bernie Madoff Ponzi scheme. Arakawa and Gins cofounded the Reversible Destiny Foundation, an organization dedicated to the use of architecture to extend the human lifespan. They co-authored books, including ''Reversible Destiny'', which is the catalogue of their Guggenheim exhibition, ''Architectural Body'' (University of Alabama Press, 2002), and ''Making Dying Illegal'' (New York: Roof Books, 2006), and designed and built residences and parks, including the Reversible Destiny Lofts, Bioscleave House, and the ''Site of Reversible Destiny–Yoro''.

Death

On March 18, 2010, Arakawa died, after a week of hospitalization. Gins would not state the cause of death. "This mortality thing is bad news," she stated. She planned to redouble efforts to prove "aging can be outlawed." On January 8, 2014, Gins died of cancer at age 72."Madeline Arakawa Gins, Visionary Architect, Dies at 72"
''The New York Times'', January 12, 2014. Retrieved January 23, 2014.

Architectural works by Arakawa and Gins

*"UBIQUITOUS SITE, NAGI'S RYOANJI, Architectural Body ( Nagi, Okayama, Japan, 1994, Nagi Museum Of Contemporary Art) *"Site of Reversible Destiny – Yoro Park ( Yōrō, Gifu, Japan, 1995) *"Shidami Resource Recycling Model House (

Nagoya, Japan is the largest city in the Chūbu region, the List of Japanese cities by population, fourth-most populous city and third most populous urban area in Japan, with a population of 2.3million in 2020. Located on the Pacific Ocean, Pacific coast i ...

, 2005) *"the Reversible Destiny Lofts MITAKA – In Memory of Helen Keller ( Mitaka, Tokyo, Japan 2005) *"Bioscleave house – LIFESPAN EXTENDING VILLA ( Northwest Harbor, East Hampton, Long Island, NY, 2008) *"Biotopological Scale-Juggling Escalator (NYC, 2013/

Dover Street Market Dover Street Market is a multi-brand retailer originally located on Dover Street, in Mayfair, London. It has stores in New York City, Tokyo, Singapore, Beijing and Los Angeles. Dover Street Market was created by Rei Kawakubo of Japanese fashion ...

, New York, NY,

Comme des Garçons Comme des Garçons (also known as CDG) is a Japanese fashion label based in Paris that was created and led by Rei Kawakubo. Its French flagship store is located in Paris. This label owns a world-wide store chain featuring various lines of prod ...

)

Publications

Books by Madeline Gins

*''The Saddest Thing Is That I Have Had to Use Words''. Edited by Lucy Ives. Catskill, NY: Siglio Press, 2020. *''Helen Keller or Arakawa.'' Santa Fe, NM: Burning Books with East/West Cultural Studies, 1994. *''Helen Keller ou Arakawa. Portrait de l'artiste en jeune aveugle.'', Paris, Hermann, 2017, trans. Marie-Dominique Garnier, pref. Jean-Michel Rabaté. *''What the President Will Say and Do!!'' Barrytown, NY: Station Hill Press, 1984. *''Intend''. Bologna: Tau/ma, 1973. *''Word Rain (or A Discursive Introduction to the Philosophical Investigation of G,R,E,T,A, G,A,R,B,O, It Says)''. New York: Grossman Publishers, 1969.

Books by Arakawa and Madeline Gins

*''Making Dying Illegal, Architecture Against Death: Original to the 21st Century''. New York: Roof Books, 2006 ; Tokyo: Shunjusha, 2007. *''Le Corps Architectural''. Paris: Editions Manucius, 2005 *''Architectural Body''. Tuscaloosa, AL: University of Alabama Press, 2002 *''Reversible Destiny: We Have Decided Not to Die''. New York: Abrams, Inc., 1997, *''ARCHITECTURE: Sites of Reversible Destiny: Architectural Experiments after Auschwitz-Hiroshima''. London: Academy Editions, 1994. *''Pour ne pas mourir. To Not To Die''. Paris: Editions de la différence, 1987. *''Mechanismus der Bedeutung. The Mechanism of Meaning''. Introduction by Lawrence Alloway. Munich: Bruckmann, 1971 ; New York: Harry N. Abrams, Inc., 1979, 2nd edition ; New York: Abbeville Press, 1988, 3rd edition. *''For Example (A Critique of Never)''. Milan: Alessandra Castelli Press, 1974.

Essays by Gins

*'"The Architectural Body – Landing Sites" (in collaboration with Arakawa), ''Space in America: Theory History Culture'' (eds Benesch, Klaus; Schmidt, Kerstein; Fall 2005) *'"LIVING BODY Museum", ''Cities Without Citizens'' (2003), pp. 243–57 *'"Gifu-Reversible Destiny" (in collaboration with Arakawa), ''Architectural Design, Games of Architecture'' (1996), pp. 27–35 *'"Housing Complexity" (in collaboration with Arakawa), ''Journal of Philosophy and the Visual Arts, No. 6'' (1995), pp. 88–95 *'"Landing Sites/The End of Spacetime" (in collaboration with Arakawa), ''Art and Design'' (May–June 1993) *'"Person as Site in Respect to a Tentative Constructed Plan" (in collaboration with Arakawa). ''ANYWHERE (1992), pp. 54–67 *''The Tentative Constructed Plan as Intervening Device for a Reversible Destiny'' (in collaboration with Arakawa) ''A+U: Architecture and Urbanism'' (December 1991), pp. 48–57. *'"The Process in Question," Critical Relations. Highgate Art Trust, (editor) Joan Burns, Williamstown, Massachusetts (1989) *'"To Return To!" (in collaboration with Arakawa), Marcel Duchamp and the Avant-Garde Since 1950. Köln: Ludwig Museum (1988) *'Essay on Multi-Dimensional Architecture" (selections published in Boundary 2, Fall 1985/Winter 1986, and Pratt Architectural Journal, Spring 1988) *'"Forum: Arakawa's The Sharing of Nameless, 1982–83," DRAWING, Jan.-Feb. 1985, pp. 103–04

References

External links

"Seeking Immortality? Consult Reversible Destiny!"
Architizer.com; August 29, 2012. Retrieved January 15, 2014
Reversible Destiny Foundation website
Retrieved January 15, 2014
PennSound page: readings and interviews
Retrieved January 15, 2014

''The New York Times'', April 3, 2008
Site of Reversible Destiny
yoro-park.com. Retrieved January 15, 2014.

artnet.com. Retrieved January 15, 2014.
Facts and reference at askart.com
Retrieved January 15, 2014
Reference at artfacts.net
Retrieved January 15, 2014 {{DEFAULTSORT:Gins, Madeline 1941 births 2014 deaths 20th-century American architects American women poets American women architects Architects from New York City 20th-century American poets 20th-century American women writers Writers from New York City Poets from New York (state) Barnard College alumni Deaths from cancer in New York (state) 21st-century American writers 21st-century American women writers