Tadao Ando, born in 1941, is one of the most renowned contemporary Japanese architects. He has designed many notable buildings around the world, including Row House in Sumiyoshi, Osaka, 1976, which gave him the Annual Prize of Architectural Institute of Japan in 1979, and the Church of the Light in Osaka, 1989. Among the many awards he has received are the Gold Medal of Architecture, Académie d’Architecture (French Academy of Architecture) in 1989, The Pritzker Architecture Prize in 1995, Gold Medal of the American Institute of Architects in 2002, Gold Medal of Union Internationale des Architectes in 2005, Commandeur de l’Ordre des Arts et des Lettres in 2013, and Grande Ufficiale dell’Ordine della Stella d’Italia in 2015. He was a visiting professor at Yale, Columbia, UC Barkeley, and Harvard Universities. He received the Japanese Order of Culture in 2010.