The Artist:

Isamu Noguchi was an acclaimed sculptor, with his work encaptured all over the world. Noguchi was Asian-American, born to an American mother and Japanese father in 1904.

He was an international artist who traveled extensively throughout his life. Throughout his lifetime he looked at large-scale public works in Mexico, ceramics and tranquil gardens in Japan, ink-brush techniques in China, and the purity of marble in Italy and much more. He incorporated all forms and mediums into his work, utilizing a wide range of materials, including stainless steel, marble, cast iron, balsa wood, bronze, sheet aluminum, basalt, granite, and water (etc).

Some of his most important work includes “Portrait of R. Buckminster Fuller” (1929), “Death (Lynched Figure)” (1934), “The Well” (1982), and many others. “Portrait of R. Buckminster Fuller” is made of reflective chrome and shows the beginning of Noguchi’s interest in the abstract.

Noguchi was mainly associated with the Abstract Expressionist time period around the 1940s and 1950s, although not heavily tied down to any movement particularly. He was personally influenced by the attack on Pearl Harbor and the repercussions the Japanese-Americans faced. This event moved him to become a political activist, which showed not only in his life, but in his art. Due to the war and the bombing of Pearl Harbor, Noguchi was deeply affected by this time period. In 1942, he founded a group whose primary focus was to raise awareness of the loyalty of Japanese-Americans to America, called Nisei Writers and Artists Mobilization for Democracy. He also voluntarily lived at an internment camp for seven months. After the war, Noguchi spent time in Japan exploring the wreckage and issues that were raised during the war. His artwork from this time is included in his series, “Fourteen Americans”

He often synthesizes the different components of Eastern and Western cultures and art forms, making him a modernist who uses “non-Western sources” along with Western influences.  Noguchi didn’t belong to any to a particular art movement. He created art for dancer/choreographer Martha Graham, beginning a lifelong collaboration; as well as for dancers/choreographers Merce Cunningham, Erick Hawkins, and George Balanchine. This is important to address because this shows that Noguchi was influenced by American dancers and choreographers that believed that the movement/fluidity of the people and the dancers themselves was a part of the art backdrops.

The Skyviewing Sculpture:

Noguchi (1904-1988) created this sculpture in 1969 and was highly influenced by Japanese and surrealist art, with the goal to improve public spaces. His original intent when creating this was to create something that the public could interact with, which was his intent for the majority of his pieces.  In Japan the circular disk represents the sun and is a symbol of creation. The viewer is part of the art piece and contributes to it, a subtle union is provided of two creative forces, human and nature/the world together as one always moving and changing.

Noguchi’s sculptural style is one to make note of. Noguchi’s Skyviewing Sculpture (1969) in Bellingham, Washington is a large cube-like structure made of various metals, including iron, in the middle of the university campus. It is an open structure with holes that allow the viewer to go through the sculpture and look through it towards the sky. Many would state that Noguchi’s style was modernistic, but Noguchi considered himself as very anti-modernist because of how he would fuse Asian-American culture into his pieces. Isamu Noguchi was a very important sculptor of the twentieth century, whose art is still relative and acclaimed today.

Bibliography:

“Biography.” Biography | The Noguchi Museum. N.p., n.d. Web. 25 Apr. 2017. <http://www.noguchi.org/noguchi/biography>.

Isamu Noguchi, 1904-1988.; Diane Apostolos-Cappadona; Bruce Altshuler; Isamu Noguchi Foundation.; ©1994

Winther, Bert, Art Journal,  Vol. 54, No. 3, Rethinking the Introductory Art History Survey

(Autumn, 1995), pp. 113-115

“Biography.” Biography | The Noguchi Museum. N.p., n.d. Web. 26 Apr. 2017. <http://www.noguchi.org/noguchi/biography>.

“Immigration Act of 1924.” Immigration Act of 1924 | Densho Encyclopedia. N.p., n.d. Web. 25 Apr. 2017. <http://encyclopedia.densho.org/Immigration_Act_of_1924/>.

“Installation of Isamu Noguchi Sculpture.” Modern Photographers Collection. N.p., n.d. Web. 26 Apr. 2017. <http://digitalcollections.lib.washington.edu/cdm/ref/collection/hupy/id/2501/>.

“Timeline.” Timeline | The Noguchi Museum. N.p., n.d. Web. 22 Apr. 2017. <http://www.noguchi.org/noguchi/timeline>.

Group Members:

Soumya Ayelasomayajula

Annika Blackmer

Rachel Alexander