Brett Littman, director of the Isamu Noguchi Foundation and Garden Museum (the Noguchi Museum), last week announced plans to create a unified campus that will better preserve Isamu Noguchi’s work and legacy while both increasing public access to the collection and enabling the Museum to expand its roster of exhibitions and public programs.
With the original Museum and sculpture garden established by the artist in 1985, the expanded campus will include a new 6,000-square-foot building to house the Museum’s collection and archive. It will also house Noguchi’s original 1959 studio building, which will be restored and open to the public for the first time. The project will be undertaken in two stages.
The Noguchi Museum was founded and designed by American artist Isamu Noguchi (1904–1988), for the display of what he considered to be representative examples of his life’s work. Opened in 1985, the Museum complex was built around a 1920s industrial building, and features indoor-outdoor galleries and a serene outdoor sculpture garden, with two floors of interior exhibition space.
Located in Long Island City, Queens, the Museum is itself considered to be one of the artist’s greatest achievements. In building a museum, Noguchi was an early pioneer who led the metamorphosis of the Long Island City area into the arts district it is today, home to cultural institutions such as Socrates Sculpture Park, SculptureCenter, MoMA PS1, and Museum of the Moving Image, among others.
Isamu Noguchi’s 10th Street studio (work space), Long Island City, c. 1960s. The Noguchi Museum Archive. ©The Isamu Noguchi Foundation and Garden Museum, New York / Artists Rights Society (ARS).
Noguchi Museum Board Chair Malcolm Nolen states, “Following a ten-plus-year project to stabilize the Noguchi Museum building and sculpture garden, we are thrilled to be taking the necessary steps both to ensure the safety of our collections of Noguchi’s art and archival materials and to increase public access to them. As the guardians of the life’s work of one of the greatest sculptors and designers of the twentieth century, whose legacy continues to inspire artists, scholars, and the public, the Museum must work not only to safeguard the art and archives, but also to make them accessible. We look forward to continuing to find new ways to engage our many audiences.”
Mr. Littman adds, “Isamu Noguchi was a fearless, category-defying, cross-disciplinary polymath, and our new Noguchi campus, which will include the Art and Archive Building and the renovation of his 10th Street studio and apartment, will allow us to better reflect on the complex nature of Noguchi’s work and life. With greater—and easier—access to our collection and archive for our curators and researchers and a new programming space in the 10th Street studio, the Museum will be poised to more deeply explore Noguchi’s increasing relevance to and influence on the contemporary world. At the same time, it will continue to welcome visitors of all ages and backgrounds.”
The Noguchi Museum campus in Long Island, N.Y. Rendering by Büro Koray Duman.
Art and Archive Building
The first phase of the project comprises the creation of a two-story Art and Archive Building that will provide new storage space for the Museum’s holdings of both art and archival material. The new building, a corrugated steel envelope of nearly 6,000 square feet, will be designed by New York City-based architects, Büro Koray Duman, and will be located on land owned by the Museum, adjacent to Noguchi’s original studio building and across the street from the Museum.
Koray Duman, founder of Büro Koray Duman, states, “The Noguchi Museum and its garden are much beloved spaces. With the design of the new Art and Archive Building, and its relationship to Isamu Noguchi’s original 10th Street studio, we wanted to be respectful of the existing complex. The Museum’s architecture strikes a perfect balance between being impactful and quiet, simultaneously. With the new expansion and building design, we aspired to create a strong architectural statement that embodies this essence.”
The Noguchi Museum campus in Long Island, N.Y. Rendering by Büro Koray Duman.
The building’s new archive study center will enable the consolidation of the archive in a climate-controlled environment, while also creating a dedicated space in which researchers and the Museum’s curatorial and education staff can view original documents and other materials. This will in turn allow more of these items to be studied, understood, and presented to the public through publications, journals, exhibitions and education programs.
Noguchi Studio
Noguchi moved to Long Island City in the early 1960s, establishing his studio close to local stone and metal workers, and across the street from what would become his eponymous museum. Noguchi’s belief in integrating art and life is uniquely apparent in the aesthetics of this humble living space, which he described as, “a house inside a factory.”
Isamu Noguchi’s 10th Street studio (bedroom), Long Island City, c. 1960s. Photograph by Hans Namuth. The Noguchi Museum Archive. ©The Isamu Noguchi Foundation and Garden Museum, New York / Artists Rights Society (ARS).
The Museum will restore the living spaces, preserving their history while also creating opportunities for tours and other activities. While the program for this space is still being developed, the Museum anticipates broadening its work with contemporary artists to present diverse, cross-disciplinary commissions and programs that demonstrate Noguchi’s enduring influence.
The Noguchi Museum
The Noguchi Museum itself is widely considered to be among the artist’s greatest achievements. With 27,000 square feet of gallery space and a sculpture garden, the Museum currently houses both ongoing installations of Noguchi’s work and temporary exhibitions that illuminate his art, the cultural context in which it was created and its legacy. With greater access to the collection provided by the new on-site Art and Archive Building, the Museum will expand the breadth of works on view in its galleries in order to focus on the multidisciplinary aspects of Noguchi’s career, including Akari light sculptures, costumes and set pieces for dance, environmental works, playgrounds and play sculpture, household furnishings and objects, and photography. Together, these will reveal the scope and diversity of Noguchi’s practice and enable visitors to make connections between his work in different disciplines.
Upon its completion, the Museum’s expanded campus will create a comprehensive, unified site devoted to understanding the full scope of Noguchi’s work, life, and vision, enabling the Museum to shed new light on his ongoing relevance to our time.
