The last couple of shows at the Shiodome Museum have been colorful and varied affairs, but the latest exhibition, showcasing Yukio Futagawa's photos of traditional Japanese houses taken in 1955, strikes a very different note. There is an absence of color and accompanying objects, and in its place a sense of elegant simplicity and focus, in keeping with the subject and the medium.

Designed by rising young architect Sou Fujimoto, the exhibition reproduces large prints of Futagawa's detailed monochrome photographs and hangs them from wires suspended from the ceiling in an irregular pattern that encourages viewers to randomly browse through them, rather than follow the set route so beloved of exhibitions in Japan. The effect of this is to remove distractions and the conveyor belt pressures that "one route" exhibitions impose on viewers, and thus to encourage deeper concentration on the images themselves.

Futagawa is a noted architectural writer and photographer, who, at the age of 80, still remains active. The 70 photographs in this exhibition are drawn from his early opus "Traditional Japanese Houses," a prize-winning 10-volume series of 280 photographs of minka, literally "houses of the people," taken in 1955. The term evokes humble, local styles of architecture in contrast to the grander and gaudier residences of the rich and powerful.