Announced on Thursday, September 10, the five Praemium Imperiale Laureates are Tadanori Yokoo for painting, Wolfgang Laib for sculpture (we talk about him on Domus 994 Green special report), Dominique Perrault for architecture, music and Mitsuko Uchida for Sylvie Guillem for theater / film.

Winners are chosen by the Japan Art Association, and nominated by advisors based in the United States, France, Italy, Japan, the United Kingdom, and Germany. The former president of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, William Luers, leads the nominating committee in America.

Now in its twenty-seventh year, the award in previous years has recognized cultural figures including Ingmar Bergman, Frank Gehry, Jean-Luc Godard, David Hockney, Willem de Kooning, Akira Kurosawa, Renzo Piano, and Robert Rauschenberg.