Tadao Ando was born in Osaka, Japan in 1941. He did not receive any formal architectural schooling. Instead, he self-educated by reading and traveling extensively through Africa, Europe, and the United States. In 1969 he established his own firm, Tadao Ando Architect & Associates. Ando developed a radically new architectural style characterized by the use of unfinished reinforced concrete structures. He has received many awards for his work. Since 1987 he has taught at various American universities including Yale, Columbia and Harvard.

From 1997 to 2005 he was teaching at the Graduate School of Architecture of Tokyo University. Since 2005 he has been a professor emeritus at Tokyo University.
As a printmaker, Tadao Ando published his first edition “Scene I & II” in 1984. In 1998, he made his representative work “Tadao Ando Prints 1998” that consisted of 10 pieces of prints.